Sapotaweyak Cree Nation signs deal to buy Swan River land

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This article was published 14/08/2017 (2445 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

Sapotaweyak Cree Nation and the Town of Swan River will sign a deal Wednesday for a second parcel of land the First Nation bought through a treaty land-entitlement agreement.

An initial deal was signed in 2012 for the first urban reserve in Swan River, where the Club Sapp gaming centre is now located. It employs about 15 workers.

The second piece of property is a city block that was once the location of the Swan River Valley Hotel on Main Street in this town of about 4,000 located nearly 490 kilometres northwest of Winnipeg.

The mayor said he’s looking forward to commercial development of the site that the town took over for unpaid back taxes and later sold to Sapotaweyak.

“It’s a seamless thing. We have a good relationship with Sapotaweyak Cree Nation and the agreement we’ll sign is basically the same as the last one.” Mayor Glen McKenzie said by phone.

Still, a lot of people don’t fully grasp the benefits of deals like this, the mayor said.

“People have an issue with a memorandum of understanding. They think they’re losing taxes but with a memorandum of understanding they pay a service fee that’s equivalent of what the property taxes would be and they’re treated like everybody else, the same services that any resident of Swan River would get and they pay an equivalent amount,” the mayor said.

Such urban developments, officially called municipal development and service agreements, open a door to commercial streams of revenue for First Nations.

“Basically it’s an opportunity for Treaty Land Entitlement and neighbouring communities to establish commercial centres and create our own revenues,” Sapotaweyak Chief Nelson Genaille said.

“There are also economic spin-offs for the neighbouring communities,” he added.

In 2012, Sapotaweyak established its first commercial development in Swan River, with the opening of the gaming centre. Before that, the nearest casinos were in Yorkton, The Pas or as far away as Winnipeg.

There are two different plans for the former hotel site, one that involves a gas bar and the other that would see a two-storey office complex built on the property, the chief said.

Genaille said there’s no decision yet on which plan the First Nation will pursue.

The service agreements are key milestones in the treaty land entitlement process, paving the way for Canada to set urban lands aside as reserves for First Nations. The process fulfills land entitlements that were promised in treaties signed over a century ago.

Once the mayor and the chief sign the agreement Wednesday, a copy will be forwarded to the province for the next step in the process.

The province must file a provincial order in council with Ottawa to officially convert the land to reserve status, which then allows for development to proceed.

Genaille hopes Ottawa will sign off on the conversion in time to mark the First Nation’s treaty with the crown, Treaty 4. That treaty was Sept. 15, 1874 and covered most of southern Saskatchewan with small portions of western Manitoba and southeastern Alberta added later on through 1877.

alexandra.paul@freepress.mb.ca