Quebec minister visits to talk land

Mohawk Council of Kahnawake (MCK) grand chief Cody Diabo met with Indigenous affairs minister Ian Lafrenière for lunch at the Kahnawake Brewing Company this past Friday to talk about land that’s still owed to the community. 

The province still owes 211 acres of land to Kahnawake to make up for the expansion of Highway 30 - a promise that’s stalled for several years now. Lafrenière previously told The Eastern Door that he intends to see this resolved by the fall.  

Diabo said the minister has offered up various parcels of land that the MCK is still in process of considering. The MCK grand chief has also brought forward his own suggestions, namely St. Nicholas Island.

“I don’t think it should be something that takes a long time, at least if we can agree on the parcel,” Diabo said.

“There’s different options that have been proposed,” he added. “The goal is for it to be adjacent or connected to Kahnawake - it’s not going to be in the middle of nowhere.”

Historically the band council in Kahnawake - back then known as Caughnawaga - claimed St. Nicholas Island as part of its territory. As of the early 1900s, Canada also recognized the five-acre island east of St. Bernard Island as Kanienʼkehá:ka land.

The community lost it however after the Quebec government staked claim to it and sold it in 1906. Subsequent court proceedings failed to secure Kahnawake’s title to the land.

As it stands today, the Quebec government describes the island as a piece of “non-organized territory,” part of the regional county municipality of Roussillon.

“I brought up the various islands that surround the territory,” Diabo told The Eastern Door in the leadup to his meeting with the minister. “There’s St. Nicholas Island and there are also other ones more on the eastern side that I’m looking at.” 

A stretch of wooded land along Highway 30 in Chateauguay has also been among the areas he’s brought forward. The city is currently proposing to build upwards of 2,000 housing units across the roughly 70-acre parcel of land bordered by Saint-Jean Baptiste and Pierre-Boursier boulevards. Wetlands situated in the woods would have to be destroyed to make way for the development. 

“It’s good to know that there’s still work happening,” Diabo said about Lafrenière’s commitment to resolve the land return. “But as I’ve stated, we’re also not going to be waiting around for months and months for results. We need to see some quick results on their end.” 

The Quebec government has already returned nearly 500 out of 700 acres of land it promised Kahnawake back in 2007 in exchange for the expansion of Highway 30. All those acres of land border the highway.

During the hour-long meeting at the brewery, the two also got to talking about the memorandum of understanding the MCK sent the provincial government over a year ago.

“The ball is still in their court in terms of what they’re good with,” Diabo said. “He wanted to touch base to say that they're still working on it.”

The MCK has an already established memorandum of understanding with the federal government as of this May.  

The Eastern Door reached out to Lafrenière office for an interview about his visit to Kahnawake, but was told the minister wasn’t available to speak. 

This article was originally published in print on September 13 in issue 33.37 of The Eastern Door.

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