ADAMS LAKE INDIAN BAND
ALL CANDIDATES FORUM NOTES TAKEN
Sunday, February 5, 2012
6:00 PM TO 8:00 PM

LOCATION:            ADAMS LAKE INDIAN BAND GYMNASIUM
Opening Prayer by:         Elder Lawrence Michel
Opened the forum at:        6:14 pm

Sharon Sellars, Deputy Electoral Officer, opened the forum to the Candidates, and chaired the meeting until the Alternate Electoral Officer showed up.

NOTE: ALL CANDIDATES FOR BOTH CHIEF AND COUNCIL WERE PRESENT AT THE FORUM.
Approximately 76 Electors of the Adams Lake Indian Band attended the forum

QUESTION & ANSWER

CANDIDATES FOR CHIEF:

Tom Dennis: 6:15 pm to 6:30 pm
1.    Question: can you elaborate on the laws; Tom, Family Laws are currently on an electoral model right now; this is something that I would focus on.
Tom:The Chief needs to be able to speak with the elders, go to them; don’t expect them to come to us. Family’s in the community get mail outs to the people, there needs to be a better process in communication.

Nelson Leon: 6:30 pm to 7:46 pm

1.    Question: what kind of financial independence will you be doing for our band?
Nelson: Management and Use, Negotiate benefits to the band, revenue in mining, forestry, tourism, sustainability and economic independence.
2.    Question: What about an Old Age Home here on ALIB, do you have any plans for this?
3.    Question: what about promoting our Secwepemc language programs, especially in the schools. Time is growing short for this.
4.    Question: I want to ask a question about the land negotiation that is ongoing with the Ministry of Highways on the property that I live on and have live on for 20 or more years now. No one’s made a choice or an effort to deal with this. I have been after the band to make a stand, and I am asking the new council to make a stand and claim this land on my behalf. I have claimed it as my own, and I am still there. So, why hasn’t the band done this too? Are you going to do anything about this?
Nelson: this was supposed to be a contribution from Highways as part of the bridge right of ways, at the time it didn’t meet the bands expectations, and it was opposed. There is band land that we are looking at (being traded). How do we change band land over here, it is a controversial issue. Need to communicate better
5.    Question: Alternative funding and housing issues on our band,
Nelson:CMHC is not going to work for us in the future. We need to work on other alternatives for housing and to solve this problem ourselves.

QUESTION & ANSWER
BAND COUNCIL CANDIDATES:

Henry Anthony: 6:55 pm 7:10 pm
1.    Question: brought up the land issue earlier and I want to address this as it is important to our band.
2.    Question: what about the contracts that are handed out for the Road Maintenance by the contractors in town. Why can’t we get these contracts for our band members to do, put them to work, and buy our own snow blowers and road maintenance equipment and get these contracts ourselves?
Henry: few have applied to do these contracts and it is something we will be working on in the future.

Karen Everard:
1.    Question: does the band play a bigger role in Secwepemc Child Services-visits; how active is the band in the services provided by Secwepemc Child Services. Karen; my role as a board member is a political one; but we do have strategic planning sessions that 7 bands are active in.
2.    Question: I have asked you several times how many families from Adams Lake are foster parents and you have never answered me, so how many families from Adams Lake Band are foster parents?
Karen: we have 23 children in care living on Adams Lake, so my best guess is 15 families are foster parents. We are trying to recruit more families from AdamsLake to be foster parents. We need a better communications plan
3.    Question: how will you engage the children in the decisions?
Karen: we want to set up a mentor program for the youth; and to have an active youth group, and even to have a youth sit at our council table.
4.    Question: what about the hall rent? It went up and there were some youth groups who couldn’t afford the rent, and it should be made for everyone’s use.
Karen: the rent was changed back to $50.

Georgina Johnny: 7:45 pm to 8:00 pm

1.    Question: where can we get more education funding for your youth
Gina: training we have an all-women’s training program happening right now, forestry too.
Ron Jules: 7:55 to 8:10 pm

1.    Question: what about the highways project what do you plan on doing about this?
Ron: we have to look at this, and we need housing lands, we need additions to reserve for the housing. The CPR wanted the 4 lanes to come down on we wanted to trade for land, not the money but I don’t know what happened to this.

Doreen Kenoras:  8:08 pm to 8:23 pm

1.    Question: we are looking for new rev, have you thought about looking at mining rights, what about royalties given to native bands, for on reserve mining.
Doreen: I have listened at the 3 bands re mining, we have to sit at that table, from Robin Billy there are 5 stages in mining, and if you are not in at the start you miss out. Need to review what has been done and royalties is a good idea.
2.    Question: that our band has doubled in size in 10 years, and it will double, my concern is about our grandchildren may not all be band members, and may be Bill C-31, how do you want to deal with this.
Doreen: we will have to review our policies, a lot has been done but there is a lot of review that will be happening, my grandchildren may not all be registered, how do we deal with it? We have to be open and honest with the membership, we have to be accountable with the members, these issue and concerns we are just hearing about it now.

Joyce Kenoras: 8:25 pm to 8:40 pm
No questions from the floor
_______________________________________________________
MOTION TO ADJOURN: Time: 8:40 pm
Moved by:    Ronald Jules
Seconded by:    Joyce Kenoras