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Racial remarks, threats of ousting fuel hot Band Council debate By Donna Durie Writer A Six Nations Band Council discussion on the future of the Burtch lands turned sour Monday when councillors and farmers hurled . accusations and racial remarks at the Hau- denosaunee Development Institute (HDI) . An angry Six Nations Band Councillor Helen Miller ac- cused the Confederacy's planning department staff of abus ing and taking ad- vantage of Confederacy Chiefs and Clanmothers. As the debate .at the Com- mittee of the Whole ses- sion grew heated District 3 Councillor Ross Johnson called for the ousting of the HDI from the community. But it turned uglier when Six Nations Farmer's Asso- ciation vice-president Art Porter hurled racial remarks at the HDI. Ironically the remarks came just as Elected Chief Bill Montour told the meeting the Blirtch lands should not come back to Six Nations under the return to reserve program, fearing the Minis- ter of Indian Affairs will continue to control the lands. Instead Montour agrees with a Confederacy stand that the land must come back under the Haldimand Deed. It's a concept the Confederacy has been pushing since Mohawk Chief Allen MacNaughton negotiated the Burtch Tract lands be returned under the Haldimand Deed. The Burtch lands have been mired in controversy since the Six Nations Farm- ers Association (SNFA) re- fused to sign a lease agreement with the Confed- eracy to farm the lands for the second year in a row. The SNFA began planting crops on the property last week, defying a direction from the Confederacy to work out a lease with the HDI , the Confederacy's planning department. Adding fuel to heated de- bate, Dan Elliott , a local contractor, claimed his company, which is currently working on the clean up of the contaminated soil at the site, was kicked off the Burtch lands last week by the HDI. However, Elliott may actu- . ally have been a victim of the farmer's push to farm the land witho.ut permis- sion. Aaron Detlor, HDI board member, said Elliott's work- ers were not kicked off by the HDI. "His company was not kicked out of the Burtch lands," said Detlor. "We had our monitor on- site advise Infrastructure ·Ontario (10) the remedia- tion needed to stop until the safety concerns were addressed. The farmers were discing next to the tree planters. If you got hit with a discer you'd be chopped into a hundred lit- tle pieces." Infrastructure Ontario is holding the lands in trust until clean-up at the site is finished sometime this Sep- tember. Councillor Helen Miller ac- cused the HDI of commit- ting elder abuse against Confederacy Chiefs and Clanmothers. "They go in and talk and use these big words and aggres- sive nature," said Miller. "They don't ask - they just tell: this is what we're doing. Everybody sits there; they don't seem to be ask- ing questions or making comments. To me, that's elder abuse. They're taking advantage of them." Detlor denied the abuse accusation."( think the chiefs are fully capable of understanding the informa- tion that we provide to them and the Chiefs are fully capable of making de- cisions," he said. "The Chiefs are fully capable of directing the HDI. We don't take any steps without the Chiefs' full knowledge and consent." Miller, however, said she believes that Confederacy Chiefs aren't aware of what the H0I is doing. "The Confederacy should know what their staff is doing. I don't think they do. Ask any Confederacy Chief what's going on - they don't know." She said the HDI is "in- timidating" Chiefs and Clan- mothers."I think they're all being intimidated so much they're afraid to speak against the HDI," she said. "I don't think they know what they're (HDI) doing and that really concerns me because they're manipulating and abusing our chiefs." Art Porter, vice-president of the SN FA, accused Detlor and HDI Interim Director Hazel Hill of tell ing t he chiefs what to do, while taking aim at their ancestry. "Two white people are run- ning the chiefs; they're telling the chiefs what to do," said Porter. Hil l's father and Detlor's mother are both Mohawk. "I don't think that racializ- ing the issue addresses any- one's concerns," said Detlor. "If that's the level of dis- course that he wants to enter into. he's going to have to do it by himself, be- cause I'm not going to par- ticipate." Detlor said the HDI has, "on-going and specific di- rection from the HCCC to ensure that safety issues (at Burtch) are addressed on an as-needed basis." The Burtch lands have been at the centre of the division between band council and the Confederacy Council since last year when band council began claiming con- trol of the Burtch lands, which were slated to be re- turned to Six Nations under the auspices of the Confed- eracy Council. Mohawk Chief Allen Mac- Naughton had successfully negotiated the return of those lands in exchange for barricades coming down during the 2006 land recla- mation. Councillor Ross Johnson called for the HDI to be re- moved but he did not pro- vide specific details on how band council would do that. "My biggest concern is the HDI," he said. "We need to get rid of HDI. That's the big question. How are we going to do it and when are we going to do it? We can sit here and beat around the bush all we want but that's the decision that we have to make. What are we going to do?" Councillor Johnson said af- terward that he has ideas on how to remove the HD(. which are confidential, that he is going to discuss with band council. "I got a lot of plans inside of me t hat I won't reveal ," he said. "It has to be discussed. We have to do something." Miller said it's up _to the community to "get rid of' the HDI. "The community I guess can get rid of HDI if the comm unity stands up and says we don't want 'em. It's up to the community to get rid of them." Elliott said his company was told to leave the Burtch lands last Monday after- noon by the clean-up com- pany Quantam Murray's project manager. "They tell me that Aaron Detlor and Hazel have a lot of pull with Infrastructure Ontario," said Elliott. "The project manager called me (last) Friday and they told me they can't do nothing unless Infrastructure On- tario tells them to go back." Elected Chief Bill Mon- tour had invited the farmers to Monday's committee meeting to "get a better un- derstanding of what's going on." The SNFA is farming the Burtch lands without a lease from either the Con- federacy or band. Detlor said there is no hope of signing one with them this year. He said another group of farmers is willing to sign a lease to farm the Burtch lands. The SNFA started planting last Monday and is working about 290 acres of land. without permission from the band or Confederacy. They said they'll donate the profits back to the commu- nity. They said they do- nated, $ I 5,000 to community groups 1st year after their first year of farm- ing the land without per- mission . The SNFA's previous five-year lease with the Confederacy ran out in 2011. Jesse· Porter, another Six Nations farmer. said they couldn't afford the HDl's quoted lease rates of $50 to $175 an acre. Aaron Detlor said the $50 figure came on the advice of other farmers in the com- munity. "We indicated to the (SNFA) that $50 per acre was a starting point and that the amount of the rate was not critical whereas the signing of the (Continued from page 9)