B.C. chief rejects payment, slams high salaries

Jack Mussell has some advice for anyone aspiring to lead an aboriginal reserve in Canada: "If you want to become chief, don't do it for money, do it because you love it.

"The money on reserves doesn't belong to the chiefs or the band councillors," he adds, "it belongs to the kids. It should be used for their future."

Mr. Mussell is Chief of the Skwah First Nation, a small reserve of about 450 members on the outskirts of Chilliwack, B.C. At the age of 68 he's been chief, off and on, for more than 25 years, and he bears the distinction of having never collected a cent in salary or honoraria for running his reserve.

His only payment, which he reluctantly accepts, is a $1,000-a-month allowance for work-related expenses.

Compare that to the six-figure salaries earned by dozens of chiefs on other reserves across Canada.

The Canadian Taxpayers Federation recently released federal documents showing that more than 30 unnamed chiefs collect more than $110,000 a year. That's a higher after-tax income than many of the country's premiers earn for running entire provinces.

The highest chief's salary in 2008-09 was $247,100.

Such revelations reinforce public stereotypes of native chiefs and band governments as out-of-touch and unaccountable to the people they serve. Many -- like the leaders of the Enoch Cree Nation in Alberta, or the Crane River reserve in Manitoba--have been accused of feathering their own nests and growing rich off their positions, while ordinary residents live in poverty.

Less well known are the reserves where leaders earn little or nothing for their work. The federal documents showed that among the country's roughly 600 native bands, at least 80 chiefs made less than $30,000 last year, and five chiefs made nothing at all. The government won't say which chiefs earn what, but one of the leaders who works for free is Mr. Mussell.

Mr. Mussell has always made a good living for his family as a logger, fisherman, home-builder and rancher. "I make my own money," he says, "and, in 25 years of being chief, I've never drawn a salary."

A maverick among other aboriginal leaders in B.C., Mr. Mussell's band is one of the few Sto: lo communities not to affiliate itself with its tribal cousins in either the Sto: lo Nation or the Sto: lo Tribal Council. The Skwah reserve prefers to go it alone -- and one of the reasons is Mr. Mussell's disdain for the attitudes of many fellow chiefs.

At first he refuses to comment on the high salaries other chiefs earn, but finally says: "I'm frustrated with them.

"These Chilliwack tribes, they [the chiefs] pay themselves big money, and they're paying it to themselves to have a lot of fun. The money doesn't belong to the chiefs. It belongs to the kids on the reserve.

"I do not want to be in their company. Don't even mention me along with them -- and don't even call me 'Chief.' I'm Jack, your neighbour, the guy who wants to help you."

Grand Chief Clarence Pennier, who heads the Sto: lo Tribal Council, has little to say about such criticisms, except to acknowledge that Mr. Mussell's band likes to do things differently. Some chiefs get paid more, he says, because they run reserve-owned businesses and partnerships with private industry.

Too much free government money and too little personal responsibility are at the root of what ails aboriginal communities today, says Mr. Mussell, who blames "non-Indians" -- and the system that keeps natives and their land under the thumb of the Crown -- for the sense of entitlement shown by many native leaders.

"Sure, there's guys that are corrupt and greedy on reserves," he says. "We're told constantly by the federal government that we're wards of the state, that we don't own what we have. So naturally people are going to come in and grab what they can.

"As far as I'm concerned, it's time to stop fooling around and get to work. We have to pull up our socks, solve our own problems, and stop playing around with easy government money."