Well into year two of a significant chapter in Haldimand County and Six Nations history an important event has yet to occur.
Haldimand County council members, Six Nations band members and Haudenosaunee Confederacy Chiefs have not met face to face.
Based on my work, I have some understanding of issues that might stand in the way of such interchanges.
We all agree that land rights and First Nations issues predominantly rest on federal government shoulders and a smaller portion on the Ontario government's lap. But that does not preclude the need for interaction between communities down the road from one another.
That path has been created and I hope to see footprints on it soon.
Haldimand County council has extended invitations to both the band and Confederacy council through its First Nations Relationship Committee founded last year. As is according to their tradition and law, Confederacy Chiefs have said that a request to meet with them must come to their council.
At the recent Rural Ontario Municipalities Association conference, Band Chief Bill Montour told Coun. Buck Sloat that the two councils need to talk. Earlier Montour told The Chronicle he regularly met with Town of Haldimand council when he was chief in the late 1980s. He also said he wanted to begin meetings with county council.
On June 16, Haldimand County Mayor Marie Trainer asked Montour to meet with a few county councillors. In turn, he proposed a joint council meeting and gave her contact information for it to be scheduled.
I hope a firm date is set and that this meeting happens. I am well aware divergent opinions and beliefs exist in the county and in the Six Nations at the political level. At the least, this meeting between leaders can be a sharing of each party's position.
Even as such, it is a beginning that can lead to further dialogue. And it's a resurrection of the old Six Nations and Town of Haldimand discussions that should have l these years.
While we wait for negotiation results, we can't stand idle. Dialogue must also start on the ground, in the communities where residents
One day Barbara McDougall will walk away in her expensive shoes and Ron Doering and Murray Coolican or their replacements will zip up their briefcases one last time. And even if some land rights are settled, we will be the ones who will remain here in Haldimand County and in Six Nations territory.
Somehow we will must forge a future