Summary Report 2006 FNIT

Several ceremonies were held on Spirit Island, ranging from equinox, solstice, special day celebrations to even a wedding ceremony. Also almost every Sunday there was a sacred fire and further development of the Medicine Wheel. The development merely means the placing of stones around the circle as part of the process of maintaining the position of the central fire. The Tree of Peace is growing, although it is not as healthy as we might prefer.

I entered the mayor race in the City of Toronto in order to move the discussion of important issues that affect our Trust onto the political stage. The media mainly ignored our initiative in terms of content even though we received as much TV attention as we might have hoped for. Content is not king in Mayor races. "Mediocrity" pervades. I think that is a newly coined word, may be important in the 21st Century, and you read it here first.

We made contact (November) with Phil Fontaine ( Phil Fontaine , B.A., LL.D. (Brock), LL.D. (R.M.C.). an Anishinabe from Sagkeeng First Nation in Manitoba - and currently the Chief of the Assembly of First Nations) and Chief Bryan La Forme Current Chief of the Mississauga of the New Credit and received a commitment to meet with them to discuss the FNIT agenda, and how we might work together. We are still awaiting the meeting.

We met with Alexandra Grigorieva Ph.D. Professor of Research Institute of Indigenous Nations of the North, and amongst other titles Permanent Representative in Canada of the Association of the Northern Indigenous Peoples of Siberia. Alexandra and I are working on developing the Center for the Indigenous Peoples together now. (below)

We have also been asked to incorporate into our design an environmental Center for all the people. We have accepted this as part of the process of developing all aspects of our program - dealing with the Youth (World Youth Center), the Elders (a Healing Center for all Indigenous Peoples), the environment ( a world class environmental center), the UN Peace University, and a Spiritual gathering place (Spirit island). These ideas all to be represented by buildings and to be developed as an icon for the World with Toronto the Meeting Place as the center. (as a metaphor one might look at what was built in Greenwich for Millennium 2000.

Recognizing we do not live in a vacuum, the First Nations Peoples have established a "Governance Board" in B.C. ( http://fngovernance.org/) and we have recently requested they consider to establish the Toronto Chapter. Their current model has no representation in the Toronto area at the time of this writing.

It should be noted that our presence is construed as being representative of the Traditional peoples rather than the Elected Peoples - and this is okay. The only obstacle that this presents is that I am not a First Nations person myself, and my apprenticeship as a Hayoka Elder in Training may bring my "authenticity" into question. For me, I know my heart and I believe my work will stand for itself. Those Chiefs that have given me voice continue to support me. Keep those letters coming.

To continue: We have investigated a number of relationships that affect the Toronto Islands and the City of Toronto - oft times to no avail. The Toronto Island Community Trust and the Shaw House Corporation that operate at the "good graces" of the Provincial government - on "unsettled land claims" continue to provide an opportunity for the People to achieve a balance. The Mississauga are still negotiating the Claim, although by all appearances it is not moving forward. The Federal Government has no rush to settle and the lawyers are quite happy to continue their $1200 per day per month appointments. We are attempting to orchestrate the Sunshine Seniors Center on Toronto Islands as a "home base" with a view to developing the building to serve all the people rather than just one program over a period of 4 1/2 months.

I have determined that we need a Banker (for our Trust) to be brought in to purchase the claim on behalf of the People - from the Mississauga, and the Trust (our Trust) purchase the claim. Terms of Payment to be determined. We will then establish the frame for operating the Lands purchased and use the situation to establish the Buildings referred to above in the Portlands. The actual economics of the transaction will shift as I am reasonably certain after the business deal is put in place the Federal Government will purchase our Trusts interest. In order to have this actualized a banker need be found, and a "win" fee determined for the Banker in a fair and equitable manner.

We have also instigated a program under the aegis of the Homeplanet Alliance. The Homeplanet Paperless office. This business is being developed on a number of fronts with the most germane to this Report being the establishing of the First Nations Centers as a business center for the application of the Program. The paperless office will give First nations peoples a tool that can point to responsible use of funds, and a "better" tool than the Canadian government uses to "account for" funds and the application of its own funds.

We are in the test phase right now with anticipation of moving the program out to 27 Centers after we prove the efficacy of the program. A second step would be to petition the Federal Government to allow First Nations Peoples to manage their own funds - especially the $1.9 B allocation that arose due to the Residential School Settlement. This could be a tremendous opportunity to save on administration costs that are rumoured to be in the $500 million dollar area (excluding the $100 million dollar allocation to the lawyers.)

We also were instrumental in having one of the lead women at the Caledonia sit in Dawn Hill named as a Special representative of the IAEWP - whose Secretariat is determining what best terminology to apply to reflect the important status that Dawn holds on behalf of the peoples. This to be determined shortly from the date of this writing.

It should also be noted that we have approached the Rotman School of Business to develop a business course - on Integrative Thinking using the Fourth Way as a "teaching tool" for Indigenous Peoples and others. We have begun the work on this and have a tentative go forward. We need to raise $100K (key money) to make certain this happens in the next year.

We ourselves are using the Integrative Thinking model of Rotmans to develop the Homeplanet Paperless Office. We are establishing the infrastructure to build this business.

In August we met with the World WIsdom council and suggested that they may like to develop the Wisdom council as an advisory Board to supervise the Control and spend function of our Trust. Ervin Laszlo liked the idea at first blush - however I think it is being lost in their process, and we may have to continue the development of the Council on our own.

Product Red and 1% for the Planet - two separate ideas using parts of our philosophical underpinnings are both growing - but not at the required rate. In particular Product Red has allowed us to create a new term - "redwashing" to go along with bluewashing, and greenwashing as a matter for allowing for corporations to benefit from helping the planet but also minimizing what they do - a product acceptance and not a "corporate acceptance".

We must recognize our function is to shift $100 Billion a year in world expenditures if we expect to end world poverty. . This task is made more difficult rather than easier by the distractions of Product Red and the 1% for the Planet initiatives. Had we lawyers and the mind to do so we should be in the court of world opinion rather than where we are today. Again "mediocrity" prevails.

We have approached the Peace University in Costa Rica to avail ourselves of the materials and information that was developed with $2.9 M of our governments money. We have made contact and a reply will be forthcoming next week.

As we enter into 2007 we are busy planning with a new team to leverage what we have, and what we know, and trusting that our direction is what is needed for our planet. We do know that we are ready. We have a vision that is easy to comprehend, and moves us beyond the "fear" mentality that pervades. Terrorism of the "spirit" is unhealthy. We need to build bridges between the tribes of Abraham - this has never been more true than at this moment in time. and we are ready to do this.