"Natural resources issues discussed at council"

OHSWEKEN - After scheduling an hour and a half for a special presentation at their February 3rd meeting, S/N Council was left with a very short agenda when the group did not show up.

Mervin Dewasha was expected to make a presentation on Corporate Services, and Jamie Hill and Myra Wabegijig were to discuss the Health Information System (HIS), but neither put in an appearance.

Phil Monture from Land research, also scheduled as a delegation, did make his report to council. Monture is working with Health Canada, who is paying to test the water quality on Six Nations. He has been discussing the implementation of a new water treatment technology with various groups.

The system, called NovaAqua Water, is already in use in areas of the U.S., and is extremely high-tech. Monture was unprepared to discuss details at this point in negotiation but said that the system uses a natural process to treat water, as opposed to traditional chemical techniques.

Councillor John Peters asked "is this study just to make recommendations we can't do anything with again, or are there some dollars tied to it?"

Monture assured council that for now they just need a corner of the water treatment plant to do the studies necessary, but that Industry Canada is interested in a joint venture with S/N. He said, "it will be a long, tedious process of negotiations."

S/N Council agreed to give a letter authorizing the necessary studies to be done. Monture was excited about the project, which is still in the very preliminary stages, saying, "we have negotiated for our own, independent water monitoring system in the Grand River territory, and this could be part of it. It would potentially be a research centre, if

Council also discussed briefly the problem, identified by Natural Resources Canada, of 280 open gas wells located in the territory. The majority of them are seeping gas, according to the study. The government wants them to be licensed.

Councillor John Peters expressed concern over the situation, saying, "the last gas well we closed up, it took $20,000 to do it. We just can't deal with this financially, its impossible."

An expert on gas wells from Calgary is coming to study the situation with the gas wells in the very near future.