Before I begin with the body of my presentation, I want to acknowledge that I am privileged to be speaking to you today from the traditional and unceded territories of the Squamish, Musqueam and Tsleil-Waututh peoples.
My name is David Eddy and I am the CEO of Vancouver Native Housing Society. We were created to serve the urban indigenous community in Vancouver in 1984. We have about 850 residents within 20 buildings.
I am here to speak about the urban indigenous community and the federal plan for an indigenous housing strategy. I'm on the working group of the CHRA indigenous caucus. CHRA is the Canadian Housing and Renewal Association and their responsibility and raison d'être is to ensure that every Canadian has a safe place to call home.
I am on the indigenous caucus working group and we are trying to convince the federal government of the importance of looking at the urban, rural and northern—or as we say, URN—indigenous housing community as a distinct sector. Right now, the federal government only looks at indigenous people in Canada as three distinct entities. Those entities are first nations, Inuit and Métis.
It strikes us as incomprehensible that there is not a separate distinction for the inhabitants of the urban, rural and northern native communities. We know from the last StatsCan survey that only 13% of indigenous folks live on reserve. There is no question that the vast majority of indigenous people in Canada are urban, rural or northern constituents and call these areas home. For them to be more reasonably supported, represented and accounted for, we've come up with a proposal that we call FIBI, which stands for “for indigenous, by indigenous”, that supports our contention for a fourth strategy: the urban, rural and northern strategy.
In the seventies through the mid-nineties, Canada was regarded as the envy of the western world in terms of its housing programs, which were created and supported mostly by the federal government. In 1978, CMHC came out with the urban native housing program. It was an innovative, well-thought-out, highly regarded and, some even said, well-funded housing initiative. It took into consideration the unique needs, challenges and obstacles that members of the urban indigenous communities had to face. It recognized, for example, that capacity needed to be built, and to an extent, it funded that. It was ahead of its time, and looking back, I don't think it would be a stretch to say that it was a sincere attempt at reconciliation before reconciliation was regarded as the concept it is now. That's the kind of government recognition we would like to see again for our residents.
This is not a complicated matter from the point of view of mathematics or fairness. Where it seems to get tricky and intractable is in the political arena. We have never received an opinion from the federal government as to how our rationale might be faulty, ill-conceived or nonsensical. Whenever we present to government, we get asked questions that imply those asking understand and are empathetic to our dilemma. We see folks nodding their heads, scratching their chins pensively and it's like Archimedes in the bathtub, a eureka moment. We think that finally they get it. Then the session ends, people go on their way and we never hear back from them.
It has been a rough row to hoe over the past number of years, but we are finally starting to get traction. These committee sessions are the most obvious evidence of that. There have been statements made and different resolutions passed recently by various bodies to look at URN as a viable fourth distinction. There are over 100 urban native housing organizations across the country, many with over 40 years of experience in providing housing and services to this distinct and unique population. It would be bordering on criminal to separate these residents from their long-term, trusted and caring providers. This system ain't broke; please don't try to fix it.
In B.C., we have the first grassroots indigenous housing authority operating and managing urban indigenous housing providers in the country. The Aboriginal Housing Management Association, known as AHMA, oversees the operations of 41 member organizations and has done so independently for the last nine years. Ontario Aboriginal Housing Services does similar work out of Sault Ste. Marie and is the largest housing provider in the province.
From Newfoundland to Yukon, our sister organizations are delivering essential housing services to members who do not fall under the three distinct categories recommended by the feds. That is a massive amount of experience and expertise that stands to be lost, to say nothing of the lives and communities disrupted if a fourth distinction of urban, rural and northern housing communities is not recognized and embedded into an indigenous housing strategy.
Thanks for hearing me.