Good morning.
My name is Jean Poirier. I was born in Alma, Quebec. In 1965, life events got me to accept employment in northern Saskatchewan. My young years with the Aluminum Company of Canada prepared me for a more diversified life than I would have ever expected. At the time, La Ronge, Saskatchewan, was a community of 250 white residents surrounded by 2,500 indigenous people. It was quite a friendly family; we had no problems. Everyone wanted a job or they were happy trappers in winter, guides in summer, living on secluded lakes in cabins they called home. And, yes, for them it was a home to be proud of. I witnessed this many times, as I owned eight different fishing or hunting camps at different locations.
During our first year, we opened a small coffee shop. Our summer employees were young native girls from the boarding school. In winter we were very slow. We handled the coffee shop by ourselves and even took catering contracts for work on the reserve. All our construction projects were handled by me, with the help of aboriginal friends. The coffee shop grew to be one of the best steakhouses in the province and was a good training ground for our native youth.
In 1967, I started to work on a tourist resort development that included a golf course. Not everyone was in favour of an individual becoming the sole owner of this development, and finally after a few changes in the provincial government, I had no choice but to let the interested individual take over. In 1989 they had failed and I took over and constructed what is today Eagle Point Resort. The project was used as a training program for heavy equipment operators. The golf course was built and maintained by aboriginals who never golfed or had seen a golf course before. The restaurant was sold, but the money was reinvested in construction companies, including heavy equipment, concrete ready mix. With these companies, our main workforce was native people from the Cree and Dene nations. Naturally, a part of the mix included Métis, so all the time the evolution of the native was right under our eyes. When I say “evolution”, I also mean changes.
Our two main employers in the north are uranium companies. Both companies show me confidence and I work at all their projects, with up to 128 people, again of Cree or Dene ancestry. To be a contractor at the mine, you have to employ 70% northerners. I employed over 80% at all times, and again trained young people to become carpenters, electricians, mechanics, welders, pipefitters, millwrights, basically all the trades for such a project. At one of the mines, I had continuous work for over 17 years.
In 2012, I was asked by a wild rice harvester to take over the sale of wild rice internationally. The band gave them notice of discontinuance as they would be losing their main buyer. Wild rice harvesting in northern Saskatchewan employs up to 500 people of aboriginal ancestry. For many of them this is their only revenue for the year.
This is my short presentation to tell you who I am and how much I know about native people. It has always been a very close connection.
Thank you.