Twenty Years after Protester Killed in Ipperwash Crisis, First Nation Votes on $95M Land Deal with Government

Aboriginal residents along the Lake Huron shore north of Sarnia, ON, are voting today on the future of the land where Aboriginal protester Dudley George was killed 20 years ago this month. A yes vote on the deal between the Chippewas of Kettle and Stony Point and the federal government will bring the First Nation $95 million in federal money, plus the return of around 1,000 hectares of land and a former army base established during World War Two by removing native families.

The dispute in the Ipperwash area has seemed frozen solid during the years since George's death from a bullet fired by a police sniper. George, 38, became the "first Aboriginal person to be killed in a land-rights dispute in Canada since the 19th century," according to the commissioner who led the inquiry into his death.

Occupiers who moved on to the site before the 1995 confrontation between protesters and a police tactical squad still live in the ramshackle, deteriorating army camp buildings. Some have come and gone over the years, past the lifting barrier arm where other band members, employed by the Department of National Defence (DND), control access to the fenced-off land from the old guard shack. Arguments and bickering between the occupiers and the established band have continued at a low level, as Stoney Point (locals spell it with an "e") remains a no-man's land where direct conflict has been avoided but it's hard to see if anyone is really in charge.

Now that years of on-and-off negotiations have produced an agreement to return the disputed land, some band members welcome it as a historic breakthrough, while others feel the deal with Ottawa will only further divisions in the area.

Dudley George's brother Pierre won't be supporting the 145-page agreement, seen by this writer.

"It's a big scam," he told VICE, saying he and other descendants of the 15 families forced off Stony Point feel the land should be returned only to them, not to the Chief and Council at Kettle Point, where the Stoney Point families went after their eviction in the 1940s.

George, diagnosed with Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder after the desperate nighttime drive to a distant hospital with his dying brother in 1995, lives at Stony in a small home he built himself with materials salvaged from the old army buildings.

"I've had 20 years of freezing my ass off, but I've finally insulated it, " he said.

If the band accepts the historic deal, the First Nation council promises to use the money for development of the army camp lands and individual compensation, according to the agreement. However, there are no written guarantees of compensation directly to Stoney Point heirs in the document, and George doesn't trust he'll be treated fairly.

A CBC story says that descendants of those who lived on the land before the government expropriated it could receive $150,000 each.

With Kettle Point Chief Tom Bressette promising all band members $5,000 each from the agreement money if the deal is accepted, George says Bressette is just "buying votes" to get the deal passed. That pledge, made at band information meetings this summer, was confirmed by councillor Marshall George. The band will also give $10,000 to seniors who lived at Stoney Point, the councillor added. Chief Bressette won't be commenting before the vote is complete, his communications officer said.

The Kettle and Stony Point First Nation has about 2,400 members, of which about 1,300 live on the reserve.

The vote is really a chance to bring his people back together, says Councillor George. He says many of his people, including himself, have parents or grandparents descended from both communities, and a yes vote will cement their heritage and provide economic opportunities in the future.

There are, however, possibly a host of small, but literally explosive problems that will delay development in and around the former military lands for up to 20 years. The fields, bush, sand dunes, small lakes, and beach are hiding unexploded munitions (UXOs), according to a DND email. Military explosive teams have responded to over 100 UXO calls there since the 1980s and have disposed of 13 UXOs, including rocket and grenade components, and pyrotechnics since investigation began in 2007, a spokesperson said.

Some disposals are remembered by Mike Cloud, a Kettle Point member who helps run the guard house. Demolition experts, including Cloud's brother and daughter-in-law, have blown up UXOs several times, including an explosion that "shook all the buildings on the base," when workers detonated rockets uncovered by a backhoe in the unoccupied bush area, Cloud says.

There is still a risk more UXOs will be found, DND confirmed.

Bombs and grenades aside, there may be other worries ahead at Ipperwash, even if the deal passes. Chief Bressette said last February that he hopes to build a cultural heritage centre near the spot where Dudley George was shot.

But he shouldn't expect the camp occupiers to move out of the way.

"We're not handing it (the land) over," says Pierre George. "This could be a stand-off situation."

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