Photo: Matthew Spence, CEO of the Yellowknives Dene First Nation, and Candice Tourville, business development officer for the Taykwa Tagamou Nation. Photos from LinkedIn.
By Sam Laskaris
Local Journalism Initiative Reporter
Windspeaker.com
More than two decades have passed since Giant Mine, a gold mine located just a few kilometres north of Yellowknife, ceased operations, but for the nearby Yellowknives Dene First Nation its memory is fresh.
The mine, which operated from 1948 to 2004, had a dark and destructive history that left lasting social, cultural and environmental impacts in the region, said Matthew Spence, CEO of the Yellowknives Dene First Nation.
He spoke at the recent Prospectors & Developers Association of Canada (PDAC) conference held in Toronto. The session was titled “Building social license: A role in community-led mining education.”
Spence said some Yellowknives Dene remain distrustful of future mining operations in the area, and this lack of trust makes it challenging for new projects to gain traction.
Spence said arsenic trioxide from Giant Mine would drift over the Yellowknives Dene community. The toxin contaminated air and water and destroyed some critical harvesting areas.
“That legacy is a very difficult legacy for the Yellowknives and one that I know makes a lot of Yellowknives angry, even 25 years after the mine was closed,” Spence said.
But other members of the First Nation have shown willingness to take another look at the mining industry. This past November, the City of Yellowknife and the Yellowknives Dene First Nation staged a pair of public workshops to provide details on modern gold-mining practices.
“It took a little bit of persuasion, but I think why we eventually were motivated to be involved was because of the educational nature of the workshop and that it was a safe space for people to ask questions and vent their concerns,” Spence said.
Members of his First Nation were interested in learning what gold mining is like today compared to 1948 when Giant Mine was permitted to operate, he said.
The workshops provided details about the current science behind gold mining today in the effort to rebuild trust with the Yellowknives Dene.
“Gold mining is something that will continue, not only in Yellowknife but in the unceded territory of the Yellowknives Dene First Nation,” Spence said.
“There’s really a need to change the way that Indigenous people participate in these projects,” Spence said. “They have to be informed early. They have to have decision-making. And they have to see meaningful benefits. And the social impacts have to be managed properly. So, that’s why we got involved with the workshop.”
Spence said the workshops proved beneficial.
“I think that we saw a bit of an incremental movement towards a more trusting relationship,” he said, adding that’s because of the new generation of Yellowknives Dene First Nation members.
“They’re better educated,” he said. “They’re more aware. And they’re also more interested in taking a higher-level role in these things. What we need to do is bring the rest of the community along. And so, what that workshop did was provided an opportunity for a safe space.
“And I think initially when it started off, it was a little rough. People were venting. They were not happy. But as the day went on, things turned into much more of a conversation and an interest in really understanding how this could happen in the future and how it can happen in a way that’s going to benefit the (First Nation) and not create so many environmental issues around the community.”
The four-day PDAC conference, which ran from March 1 to March 4 attracted about 27,000 delegates from about 135 countries, included various sessions as part of its Indigenous programming.
One of those sessions was titled “Citizen attitudes toward exploration and mining in Canada: The drivers of social licence to operate for critical minerals.”
Candice Tourville, the business development officer for the Taykwa Tagamou Nation in northern Ontario, was one of the speakers for this panel. Tourville provided details on First Nations’ roles when it comes to negotiating with companies.
“Every Nation is different,” she said. “Every Nation has a voice and concerns. We have a lot of overlapping concerns with the environment. But I think it’s really important that we have that early engagement even before the permits are out to government. We want to (share) our perspective, our concerns, our questions.”
Tourville said it’s important that companies build relationships with First Nations.
“We’re not about just having transactions and here’s my project,” she said.
Tourville said an increasing number of proponents are coming and engaging early, asking not only how they can work together but what type of concerns First Nations have.
“When I’m asked that question—what are your concerns—it’s really hard to answer that because it’s more so that proponents have to understand there’s a spiritual element that you can’t quantify,” she said.
“I think what industry has to understand is that we’re connected to the fish, the land, the animals that utilize the air. We all have that connection. So, if proponents empathize with that and understand and take a minute to not just come to a community and say this is our project.”
Tourville believes companies should be asking about a community’s history, its values and take the time to build a relationship before talking business.
“We have those types of relationships where it’s just business and it is what it is,” she said. “But I find the more meaningful relationships are where we can build that trust and they get to know us on a personal level and they respect our spiritual connections to the land.”
Tourville said First Nations members have critical traditional responsibilities to the land.
“We’re the ones that are speaking for the land,” she said. “We’re the caretakers for the land. It’s the First Nation communities that live within the mining industry that will live with the impacts. So, we’re the ones that have those lasting memories of ‘I used to hunt here but now it’s a mine’.”
Tourville said there is a difference in how projects will progress, and that depends on whether they are deemed as having a stark transactional approach or one that will invest in building a relationship with the community.
“For those that want to be a transactional partner, I will be honest, I will dig my feet into the ground and I will hold permits off because it’s not the way that you want to deal with community,” she said. “It’s not the way we want to have a relationship. If you were in a marriage and you didn’t listen to your wife, well, you would be in trouble. So, it’s the same thing. You want to have that reciprocal relationship.”
Tourville was asked what pro-mining Nations can do to help increase the trust of those Nations against mining.
For starters, she said, pro-mining Nations do not have a ‘drill, baby, drill’ mentality.
“It’s about doing it responsibly along with the community and working together, building trust, having open communication about the positives, about the negatives, and not being scared to be transparent with communities,” she said.