My name is Tony Rabesca. I'm a Tlicho person.
Some of the issues I heard here today are very important for our communities. In the past I worked with CMHC and we did research on what I call “strong like two house”, based on building a house based on traditional knowledge and based on modern technology. We did some research and found out that one of the things we were missing was the community voice and the elders and the youth.
In the past, when the house was built, it used to be open. People looked at each other, listened to each other. Elders spoke and the young people listened. But today, you look at the house and everybody has their own doors. Youth have their own doors. They close the doors. They slam the doors. In the research that we did in the past, CMHC supported the project. We did a workshop with elders, and the community and the youth and then we listened to how we could build a home based on this research.
We worked with the technology and an architect to build a house. One of the things we found out about was that because of the past, back in the 1940s with the residential schools, we needed to look at bringing back the traditional knowledge of what is a home. When we asked the elders what is a home, the elders said, “Our home is our land. Our land is our home.” Based on that, we looked at some of the things from the past.
The University of Alberta came to see us and asked whether we could work together. The University of Alberta is now working on a project based on our project. They're looking at more portable homes. They're more open. We're working together on some of the projects.
Like I said, there's use in doing research for understanding how to build a home based on “strong like two“ that could be energy efficient and at the same time is based on community ownership. If you have these two together, it makes it a lot easier understanding what is a home and it makes the community feel more...because it's the ownership that's very important but at the same time it's about working together.