PRINCE GEORGE
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Citizen
Serving the Central Interior since 1916
TUESDAY, JUNE 4, 2002
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First Nations work to take on family services
Model planned to oversee child-care programs run by provincial ministry
by GORDON HOEKSTRA Citizen staff
First Nations groups in Prince George took the first steps Monday to acquiring control of services delivered now by the Ministry of Children and Family Development, an effort to reduce the number of children in care and increase their quality of life.
Of the children in care of the B.C. government in northern B.C., 73% are aboriginal, while only making up 12% of the population.
Members of the Urban Prince George Aboriginal Child and Family Commission signed a memorandum of understanding in a ceremony pledging to work together in the best interest of their families and children.
The aboriginal groups include the Lheidli T’enneh First Nation, Carrier Sekani Family Services, the Prince George Native Friendship Centre, the United Native Nations and the Nechako Fraser Junction Metis Association — representing nine bands with members living in the city and a native urban service groups.
Reaching agreement among the aboriginal groups was necessary before moving to the next stage — planning a model to oversee child and family services like mental health, foster care, parenting, special needs, youth justice, and child and family protection. The model is hoped to be worked out a year from now. Implementation could be another year after that.
“As a group, I think we’re taking a step forward, and I’m looking forward to many more steps forward,” Lheidli T’enneh chief Barry Seymour said at the ceremony at the Prince George Native Friendship Centre.
Added the centre’s executive director Dan George: “I’m confident we’ll be successful.”
The aboriginal groups acknowledge that even though there’s been three years of preliminary work, the real work begins now.
While First Nations have experience in some areas like child protection through the Carrier Sekani Family Services, in other areas like mental health they don’t have much experience, noted George HoLem, who chaired the ur-
ban aboriginal commission and is president of the United Native Nation, Local 112.
And there’s some question of how Liberal budget cuts will effect services.
But the disproportionate numbers of native children in care means First Nations must take control of services themselves, said HoLem.
For example, where in the past a youth or child in trouble might be counselled by his uncles and other extended family and moved away from the source of troubles, today, he may be apprehended, put into youth custody, perhaps assigned to a foster home, and as a result, becomes dislocated from his culture and family and put into an environment that’s “totally
alien”, observed HoLem.
“How is a young person going to work through their issues when there’s that type of serious impact on their lifestyle and existence,” he said.
The Ministry of Child and Family Development supports transfering services into the hands of First Nations.
Ministry official Doug Hayman, responsible for northern B.C., said the idea is that eventually aboriginal agencies would be "full service," taking over everything the ministry is doing now.
“It would mean that our resources would be transferred to those agencies, in time, as it unfolds, over the next few years,” he said. “It’s a big story. It’s a big change.”
Martin-Chretien feud worries divided voters
CHRETIEN
OTTAWA (CP) — As backers of Jean Chretien and rival Paul Martin lined up behind their chosen leaders Monday,
Canadian voters were confused over the most vicious public feud to date within the Liberal party.
Several Liberal members said they had fielded hundreds of e-mails and phone calls from concerned constituents the day after the former finance minister left the Chretien cabinet.
“There’s confusion, there’s anger and there’s a feeling of a huge void being created within card-carrying Liberals,” said Hamilton MP Stan Keyes, a Martin loyalist who is also chairman of the federal Liberal caucus.
The angst filtered down to local riding associations, where Liberals who supported Martin were incensed by the prime minister’s move to replace the popular Montreal MP.
“This is a disaster,” said Shawky Fahel, president of the Kitchener Centre riding association. “This is something to do with personalities and egos. I’m upset and very unhappy.”
Others blamed Chretien for exhibiting poor judgment, which they feared could end up costing the party support as it prepares for a February leadership review. But on a popular radio call-in show in Dartmouth, N.S., one caller said it was Martin who was damaging the party.
“Everything that’s bad in politics reflects around Paul Martin,” said the caller to CFDR. “I’ve got ab-
MARTIN
solutely no use for him.”
On Maritime Noon, a CBC radio talk show, a caller identified only as Harry said he no longer had confidence in the Chretien government.
While the government attempted to reassure the markets that its fiscal policies would remain unchanged, P.E.I. Treasurer Pat Mella wondered whether Martin’s replacement by John Manley would undermine expected funding increases for health care.
Quebec Finance Minister Pauline Marois sided with Martin, saying he was “a man of great competence and great talent,” although he was responsible for cuts that left the province struggling to pay for health care. Mario Dumont, leader of l’Action Democratique du Quebec, called the current rift between Chretien and Martin and opportunity for the provinces to gain more power.
Sensing an opportunity to shake the government’s popularity, federal opposition parties attempted to capitalize on Liberal disarray.
“Obviously there are opportunities for the opposition to continue to grow,” said Alliance Leader Stephen Harper after suggesting Chretien was being “dishonest” by insisting Martin had quit. “I think the public is owed an explanation as to why the most senior and popular and one of the few capable ministers is dismissed from cabinet,” he said.
—See editorial, column on page 4;
related stories on page 6
TODAY
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Gathering of the Clans
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INDEX
Ann Landers.................15
Bridge......................21
Business ................16-18
City, B.C...............3,5,13
Classified ..............20-23
Comics .....................14
Coming Events................2
Crossword ..................14
Entertainment...............15
Horoscope ..................21
Lifestyles..................15
Movies......................15
Nation ....................6,7
Sports ...................8-12
Television..................15
World....................19,24
Dad seeks DNA testing before child payments
A Northern B.C. man is pressing for mandatory paternity testing before child-maintenance orders are made.
Donald Lowndes said it’s unfair to assume a man is the father based on one party’s claim. “If anybody can point a finger and say you’re the father, that’s wrong,” he said. “In cases of reasonable doubt, I’d like to see the system changed to allow mandatory paternity testing.” He suggests the government ministry seeking the order pay for the DNA testing at the outset. If the result is positive, Lowndes said the parties should split the cost, but if the man is determined not to be the father, the government should foot the entire bill.
Lowndes, who lives part time in Prince George, said for the past three years he’s been forced to pay almost $300 per month to support a 15-year-old boy, whom he suspects may not be his son. He said he had a casual relationship with the boy’s mother, who lives in Vancouver with the teen and her other children.
“I understand that if I’m the father 1 should be paying. I don’t have a problem with that. If there had been a paternity test there’d be no question,” he said.
But at the time, he said he couldn’t afford to cover the $1,300 DNA testing, and the private laboratory demanded payment in full. The judge ordered Lowndes and the Director of B.C. Benefits — which made the maintenance application on behalf of the boy’s mother — to split the cost, but Lowndes said he still couldn’t fork out a lump sum, because he was supporting a family and working only part-time. He ran into even more problems, he said, when he couldn’t attend a hearing to contest the order and wasn’t able to get legal counsel to appear for him.
Since then, any income he’s made has been garnisheed through the Family Maintenance Enforcement Program.
Now that Lowndes has recently inherited some money, he said he can afford to pay for DNA testing. He can then apply through the court to change the maintenance order.
But he said he still wants to bring awareness to a situation he feels treats men unfairly.
A spokesperson for the Human Resources ministry said there are payment options for people. If the ministry is seeking a maintenance order, the respondent is normally expected to pay for testing. However, if the person refuses to cover the total cost, the ministry will foot the bill initially, provided the respondent puts half the amount in a trust fund. He will be reimbursed if the test is negative. The man could also sign an agreement or agree to a court order to repay the ministry over a period of time.
If there’s a delay of over five years after the child’s birth before a maintenance order is sought, the man is exempt from payir g.
Vanderhoof backs harvest hike, hopes for focused logging effort
by GORDON HOEKSTRA Citizen staff
Forest-dependent Vanderhoof supports the recent increase in annual timber harvesting because of a mountain pine beetle epidemic, but wants to ensure the boost in logging is targeted directly at infested trees, Mayor Len Fox said Monday.
“We’ll be working with the forests ministry, the (B.C. government’s) beetle boss, and anybody else that will listen, including industry, in order to get a concentrated effort on just the green attack wood (recently infested timber),” said Fox.
B.C.’s chief forester announced last week the annual timber harvest in the Prince George timber supply area will increase by 31% to help slow the “catastrophic” beetle epidemic, the largest of its kind ever in Canada.
Most of the increase is expected to be directed at an area south of Vanderhoof, a community of 4,400, at the leading edge of the epidemic in the Prince George timber supply area.
Chief forester Larry Pedersen has already said he expects the the three-million-cubic-metre increase — or about 65,000 logging truck loads — of timber be targeted at lodgepole pine that still
has pine beetle larvae in them. Logging the trees in the winter before the beetles emerge and fly again in the summer helps prevent the epidemic’s spread.
But Fox said they’ll be monitoring the increase in logging carefully because the amount of beetle infested timber in a stand of trees can vary from 65% to 90%.
Fox said they’ll also be pushing the B.C. government to ensure as much of the timber as possible is utilized in the Vanderhoof area, helping add extra shifts at existing sawmills or for secondary manufacturing.
The amount of infested timber in the Prince George timber supply area is estimated at 4.5 million cubic metres over an area of 428,000 hectares, about 30 times the size of the Prince George city boundaries. The increase in logging is meant to help the infestation spreading to the other 350 million cubic metres of mature lodgepole pine at risk in the Prince George timber supply area.
The epidemic stretches beyond the Prince George region, covering an area in north and central B.C., twice as large as Vancouver Island. More than 100 million cubic metres is expected to be under attack by the fall.
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Citizen photo by Dave Milne
ROCKY ROAD — Construction workers jackhammer old concrete from the Winnipeg Street overpass on 15th Avenue Monday. The project involves removing bad concrete from the 17-year-old deck surface, replacing some rebar and resurfacing the deck. The project may be complete in two weeks.
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