By Bill Jackson – The Regional
During a visit to Caledonia last Friday, Progressive Conservative Leader John Tory called on the McGuinty government to help Dave Brown, Dana Chatwell and her son Dax relocate from their home on Argyle Street South.
Their house, which abuts the former
Since the land dispute with Six Nations began in 2006, Brown lost his job and Chatwell closed her home-based beauty salon. Her son Dax has been enrolled at three different high schools during the past year and has been displaced from the home 38 times since the land dispute began, according to Brown.
Before making a speech and talking with the media outside a local Canadian Tire, Tory met with Brown, Chatwell and their lawyer, along with Haldimand-Norfolk PC MPP Toby Barrett.
Over a coffee, Brown illustrated the constant torment his family has coped with since 2006 and said pleas to the McGuinty Government for help have fallen on deaf ears.
He and Chatwell have maxed out credit cards, borrowed money from friends, and depleted savings including Dax's college fund.
Chatwell suffered what doctors called a mild stroke and Brown has been pushed to the brink of suicide. The couple's also coping with other health problems such as post traumatic stress and depression, taking pills and medication.
Family members have been threatened by Six Nations protesters who threaten to burn their home down and kill them, Brown said. More recently he claims to have been threatened by a protester pointing a gun, a story that is backed up by two other local residents who witnessed the incident.
"Anything that could happen to us has happened with the exception of a bullet…"
Chatwell and Brown say they had groceries stolen from their car during road blockades in 2006. Their home was ransacked just before Christmas that year and they still have an outstanding $12 million dollar statement of claim against the province and the OPP for failing to protect them and allegedly placing a hidden camera in their home without disclosure.
On Labour Day the province, at the suggestion of a local councilor, paid for Brown, Chatwell and her son to live in a Marriott Hotel for five days after Six Nations protesters blocked local roadways again.
Chatwell said she was threatened by thugs carrying two-by-four pieces of timber. The same OPP officers who turned their backs on those threatening her later came to take a statement, she added.
Such follow-up has been an ongoing trend during the past three years for Brown and Chatwell, who have called police hundreds of times to made reports.
"It takes an hour-and-a-half and then your whole day is wasted," Chatwell said.
A man facing 17 charges in relation to incidents that occurred on Labour Day was residing on the
It seems to be a place that harbors criminals according to the couple's lawyer, Michael Bordin.
Police wouldn't even come down
"The thing is, the OPP run away from issues and then ask for pictures and video," Brown said.
"It's intimidating, because who's in charge? And I have to live there everyday."
Brown and his family have trouble sleeping at night because of loud music and bright lights. A road leading to and from the occupation runs right by their back deck.
Brown presented Tory with a
The land known as
After Brown and Chatwell's home was ransacked, the province offered to give them $500 per month to rent another dwelling and also offered to transport Chatwell's son to and from school.
Such offers are insulting, Brown concludes.
The province talks of all the money being spent on policing and
"After all the money they've spent here, you'd think they would have bought my house."
Tory contends that government would be willing to help people living next to a chemical dump and would normally do something to move them out of harm's way.
He acknowledged continued lawlessness in the area and said Brown's home is constantly under siege due to no fault of the residents living there.
Officers swore a duty to uphold the law, he noted.
"I am shocked and very angered that the family was left to fend for themselves," Tory said, calling the latest plight of Brown and Chatwell the "last indignity of a long list so far."
Letters to provincial officials from Tory and Barrett asking for help for Brown and Chatwell have gone unanswered while federal and provincial governments work toward negotiated settlements on Six Nations land claims.
"If it was me," Tory said, " would not be at the negotiating table as long as the lawlessness was ongoing."
Other individuals including residents off the Sixth Line approached Tory and said he should also speak for them.
One lady said that she's been unable to sell her home for the past year-and-half.
Brown has received final notices for the payment of utilities. Meanwhile, Six Nations individuals are living in a home on the former
"I'm sure they don't get final notices," Brown said.
Mayor Marie Trainer said that provincial officials including senior negotiator John Nolan and Deputy Minister of Municipal Affairs John Burke told council a long time ago to leave the utilities on at the Douglas Creek site to avoid more problems and confrontation with protesters.
According to an email to Trainer from Ontario's Deputy Minister of Aboriginal Affairs, Lori Sterling, last week, officials are now "considering what would be appropriate to do" for Brown and Chatwell. The Minister of Aboriginal Affairs may even come down for a visit this week, the email said.
Barrett worries that if the province deals with issues related to Brown and Chatwell, others could become a "new lightning rod" for trouble. The government hasn't thought a resolution through, he said.