Welcome to Winnipeg: Where Canadas racism

problem is at its worst

How the death of Tina Fontaine has finally forced the city
to face its festering race problem.
Nancy Macdonald -January

22, 2015

The
lma Favel, Tina Fontaines aunt, cant forgive herself for letting Tina go to Winnipeg. (Photographs in this
story by John Woods)

Oh Goddd how long are aboriginal people going to use what

happened as a crutch to suck more money out of Canadians? Winnipeg teacher Brad

Badiuk wrote on Facebook last month. They have contributed NOTHING to the
development of Canada. Just standing with their hand out. Get to work, tear the
treaties and shut the FK up already. Why am I on the hook for their cultural support?
Another day in Winnipeg, another hateful screed against the citys growing indigenous
population. This one from a teacher (now on unpaid leave) at Kelvin High School, long
considered among the citys progressive schoolsalma mater to just about every
Winipegger of note, from Marshall McLuhan to Izzy Asper, Fred Penner and Neil
Young.
Badiuks comments came to light the day Rinelle Harperthe shy 16-year-old
indigenous girl left for dead in the citys Assiniboine River after a brutal sexual assault
spoke publicly for the first time after her recovery. She called for an inquiry to help
explain why so many indigenous girls and women are being murdered in Winnipeg,
and elsewhere in Canada.
Badiuks comments came while the city was still reeling from the murder of Tina
Fontaine, a 15-year-old child from the Sagkeeng First Nation who was wrapped in
plastic and tossed into the Red River after being sexually exploited in the citys core.
They came after Nunavummiuq musician Tanya Tagaq, last years Polaris Music Prize
winner, who complained that while out to lunch in downtown Winnipeg where she was
performing with the citys ballet this fall, a man started following me calling me a
sexy little Indian and asking to fk.
They came the very week an inquest issued its findings in the death of Brian Sinclair,
an indigenous 45-year-old who died from an entirely treatable infection after being
ignored for 34 hours in a city ER.
They came in the wake of a civic election dominated by race relations after a racist rant
by a frontrunners wife went viral: Im really tired of getting harassed by the drunken
native guys downtown, Gord Steevess wife, Lori, wrote on Facebook. We all donate
enough money to keep their sorry asses on welfare, so shut the fk up and dont ask
me for another handout! The former city councillor and long-serving, centrist
politician didnt bother apologizing. He lost, but not because of this.
For decades, the friendly Prairie city has been known for its smiling, lefty premiers,
pacifist, Mennonite writers and a love affair with the Jets. Licence plates here bear the
tag Friendly Manitoba. But events of last fall served to expose a darker reality. The
Manitoba capital is deeply divided along ethnic lines. It manifestly does not provide
equal opportunity for Aboriginals. And it is quickly becoming known for the subhuman
treatment of its First Nations citizens, who suffer daily indignities and appalling
violence. Winnipeg is arguably becoming Canadas most racist city.

But indigenous activists believe Tina Fontaines death also marked a turning point in
race relations; that, for perhaps the first time, the brutalization and murder of a 15year-old was not dismissed in Winnipeg as an Aboriginal problem. Ironically, from
the falls horrific events, a sense of unity has begun to emerge. Even Thelma Favel, who
raised Tina, believes her niece did not die in vain. Meaningful change will not come
easily, but all this holds the promise, however faint, of a more hopeful future for the
city.
Thelma, who never misses the suppertime news, tried to strike fear into the hearts of
her nieces, Tina and Sarah Fontaine. Shed show them TV programs on murdered and
missing indigenous women, clip newspaper articles. Its not safe out there for
Aboriginals girls, shed caution.
In the end, even she was unable to protect Tina. On Aug. 17, the girls remains were
pulled from the Red Rivers murky waters near the Alexander Docks in downtown
Winnipeg. The murder of the 15-year-old was only the most recent, horrifying example
of the violence faced by Winnipegs indigenous communitya world apart from white
Winnipeg. Police divers discovered her by accident: they were searching the Red for
the drowned remains of Faron Hall, the Dakota man dubbed the Homeless Hero for
twice saving Winnipeggers from the river that eventually took his life.

Tinas body was found in the same spot where, in March 1961, the remains of Jean
Mocharski were foundthe first cold case from Winnipeg in a new database of
murdered and missing Aboriginal women. The 43-year-old mother of seven had been
beaten and stabbed. Like Tinas, her murder remains unsolved. We value dogs more
than we do these women, says indigenous playwright Ian Ross.

Thelma, an eloquent mother of three, and her husband, Joseph, had been caring for
Tina and Sarah since they were three and four, when their father, Eugene, was
diagnosed with lymphoma. (Their mother had left the girls as babies.) Eugene had
been raising the girls on his own in Winnipeg, where he worked at a tire plant. He
knew the girls would be better off with Thelma, his aunt, who had helped raise him.
In a handwritten note dated Nov. 21, 2003, which still hangs in a simple wooden frame
in Thelmas living room in Powerview-Pine Falls, about 100 km northeast of Winnipeg,
Eugene signed over temporary custody of Tina, his little monkey, and Sarah, whom
hed lovingly nicknamed chubby. Tina, a beautiful wisp of a girl, flourished at cole
Powerview after Thelma pulled her and Sarah from their reserve school. Math was her
favourite subject. Her boyfriend was deaf; the pair communicated by texting.
Eugene was a constant presence. He never missed Christmas or a birthday. But he
never had the chance to bring them back home to Winnipeg. He became addicted to
his pain medication and the alcohol he was using to cope. On Oct. 31, 2011just shy of
the four months doctors told him he had left to liveEugene was beaten to death in a
dispute over money.
Tina was left deeply scarred. Two people were killed that night, says Thelma. Last
spring, Tina ran away twice to Winnipeg to visit her moma relationship Thelma
encouraged, feeling the girl needed another parental bond after losing her dad. In early
July, she allowed Tina to visit her mom in Winnipeg for a week: it was her reward for
excellent grades that June. The night before she left, the family gathered to pray and
ask for protection, as they do every night. The next morning Thelma gave Tina $60 and
a calling card. If things dont work out, use the calling card and Ill come get you, she
said.
When Tina didnt come home, Thelma reported her missing to police. Little is known
about what happened to her in the weeks after that. She cut off her long, black hair.
Her family believes she began using drugs. Friends say she was working in the sex
trade to earn money. She was failed repeatedly by agencies meant to protect her.
On Aug. 8, police came across Tina in a roadside stop: she was in a vehicle with a male
driver who was allegedly intoxicated. He was taken into police custody. Officers let
Tina go, even though she was listed as a high-risk missing person. A few hours later
she was rushed to Childrens Hospital after being found passed out in a core-area back
alley. Her family was not notified she was in hospital. When she woke, Child and
Family Services placed Tina in a downtown hotel where she was allowed to walk away.
(In March 2014, the average number of kids in city hotels was 65, up from 17 two years

earlier. The bloated system simply cannot cope with the huge number of children in
care in Manitoba. Almost 90 per cent of children in foster care in Manitoba are
Aboriginal, the highest rate in Canada.)
Tina was last seen on Aug. 9, shortly after 3 a.m., by a new friend. I want to go home
to Sagkeeng, where Im loved, she told her. The friend says Tina was approached by a
man who asked her to perform a sex act. Eight days later she was pulled from the river,
identified by a tattoo on her back bearing the name of her father, Eugene.
On a recent frigid weekday afternoon, a 14-year-old Aboriginal girl, coming off a high
after huffing gas, told Macleans none of her girlfriends have changed their behaviour
in the wake of Tinas murder, laughing at the suggestion. Shed known Tina. Her
friends know Rinelle Harper. Thats never going to happen to us, she said. Within
days, Winnipeg police would announce another missing Aboriginal girl last seen in the
North End. She is just 14missing more than a month.
Since Tinas death, Thelma has refused to leave her tidy home on Louis Riel Drive.
Every time I leave the house I feel like Im having a panic attack. She cant forgive
herself for letting Tina go to Winnipeg. Its like somebody ripped your heart out of
your chest. To this day, its like theyre stomping, stomping, stomping on it.
They treated her like garbage, wrapping her up in a bag and throwing her into the
river, she says. She wasnt garbage. She was my baby.
Tinas story cast a spotlight onto the shameful state of life for many Aboriginals in
Winnipeg, where disdain for poor, inner-city Natives has long bubbled just barely
beneath the surface. When measuring racism, social scientists tend to rely on opinion
polling and media analyses. Last year, for example, Winnipeg recorded the highest
proportion of racist tweets of the six Canadian cities known for high levels of hate
crime, according to data collected by University of Alberta researcher Irfan Chaudhry.
(Manitoba recorded the second-highest rate of hate crimes last year, after Ontario,
according to a recent report.)

It is difficult to isolate Winnipeg or even Manitoba in opinion polling, which tends to

group the Prairie provinces (Manitoba and Saskatchewan) together. But from them, a
deeply troubling portrait of the region emerges. In poll after poll, Manitoba and
Saskatchewan report the highest levels of racism in the country, often by a wide
margin.
One in three Prairie residents believe that many racial stereotypes are accurate, for
example, higher than anywhere else in Canada. In Alberta, just 23 per cent do,
according to polling by the Canadian Institute for Identities and Migration (CIIM).
And 52 per cent of Prairie residents agree that Aboriginals economic problems are
mainly their fault. Nationally, the figure drops to 36 per cent.
Manitoba and Saskatchewan also report the highest number of racist incidents,
according to polling conducted by the Association for Canadian Studies and the
Canadian Race Relations Foundation. In the last year, nine in 10 Manitobans reported
hearing a negative comment about an indigenous person. [tweet this] Thats compared
with six in 10 in New Brunswick, according to that poll.
Generally, when groups interact, there is a correlating drop in prejudice as
understanding grows, says Jack Jedwab, executive vice-president of the Association for
Canadian Studies. But in Manitoba, where 17 per cent of the population is Aboriginal
the highest proportion among provinces, and four times the national averageand
where 62 per cent reported some contact with indigenous people in the last year, the
opposite appears to be true. Just six per cent of people in Manitoba and Saskatchewan
consider Aboriginal people very trustworthy. In Atlantic Canada, 28 per cent do.

Just 61 per cent of Prairie residents said they would be comfortable having an
Aboriginal neighbour, compared with 80 per cent in Ontario, according to a recent
CBC/Environics poll; and just 50 per cent would be comfortable being in a romantic
relationship with an indigenous person, compared to 66 per cent in Ontario, Quebec
and Atlantic Canada.
This was a particularly bizarre result, says Niigaan Sinclair, who teaches Native studies
at the University of Manitoba; after all, he adds with a chuckle, one in two Manitobans
has indigenous blood. In the end, we are who we think we are. Culture defines identity.
In Manitoba, the problem appears to be getting worse, not better, at a time when the
Aboriginal population is the fastest-growing in the province. The province registered a
significant decline in its opinion of Aboriginal people in the last five years. Just 13 per
cent of Manitobans have very favourable views of Aboriginal citizens, the lowest
share in the country, and down from 32 per cent in 2007, according to CIIM data.
So what explains the unusually high degree of discrimination? To Sinclair, it is no
coincidence that Manitoba was the only province founded in violence. The failed
indigenous uprising headed by Metis leader Louis Riel led directly to the even bloodier
Northwest Rebellion 15 years later, creating generations of animosity. But the
playwright Ian Ross believes this discrimination is largely borne of fearthat Indians
are getting something you dont have.
Earlier this fall, Robert Falcon-Ouellette, director of the University of Manitobas
Aboriginal focus programs, hit the Grant Park Shopping Centre in Winnipegs south
end to hustle for signatures for his mayoral nomination form. The 37-year-old was a
late entrant to the election. Hed cobbled together a campaign staffidealistic political
neophytes he knew from academia and activists hed met at last years Idle No More
rallies.
It was an ugly entry into politics. I know you, a shopper told Falcon-Ouellette,
approaching him shortly after he arrived at the mall. Youre that guy running for
mayor. Youre an Indian, he said, pointing a finger at Falcon-Ouellette. I dont want
to shake your hand. You Indians are the problem with the city. Youre all lazy. Youre
drunks. The social problems we have in the city are all related to you.

Michael Champagne, left, holds weekly rallies in the North End; Jenna Wirchs life has
been filled with suicide, sex work and foster homes. (Photograph by John Woods)
Comments like these were the reason Falcon-Ouellettewho lost his mayoral run but is
currently seeking the Liberal nomination for Winnipeg Centre, a riding long held by the NDPs
Pat Martinchose to enter politics last summer. I want to change perceptions, he says. I
have my Ph.D., two masters degrees. I was in the army for 18 years, says the Cree academic,
who ties his long, chestnut hair in a tidy braid. No matter what I dofor some people it will
never be enough. Initially, Falcon-Ouellette was written off as a fringe candidate. But his
campaign took off when he outed Winnipeg as a city divided by colour, opening a door on the
soul of the city, according to local reporter Sean Kavanagh.
Shortly after, the Winnipeg Free Press released poll results showing that 75 per cent of
Winnipeggers consider the citys divide between Aboriginal and non-Aboriginal
citizens a serious problem. (Nationally, Manitobans are most worried by a rise in
racism: 65 per cent, versus 48 per cent in neighbouring Ontario.)
In the end, Falcon-Ouellette finished third. Winnipeg chose Brian Bowman, an urbane,
boyish-looking privacy lawyer over NDP veteran Judy Wasylycia-Leis by a wide
margin. In the days after the election, Bowman was anointed the citys first Metis
mayor by local media, although his heritage came as a surprise to most Winnipeggers.

Bowman, in an interview with Macleans shortly after his swearing-in, took pains to
downplay talk of a racial divide in the city: Racism affects many communities around
the country, he said. I dont like the tagdivided. It predisposes that everyone in
different groups thinks a certain way. Thats just not the case.
In light of recent events, many in the citys indigenous community were furious to hear
this from the new mayor. Its heartbreaking and insulting, says Charlie Fettah, one
half of the indigenous hip-hop duo Winnipeg Boyz. Youd have to be blind, deaf and
dumb to not see the divide. If Bowman is just going to come in singing Kumbaya, hes
the wrong mayor for this crucial juncture.

Winnipeg is physically divided by the CP rail yards, which cut the primarily Aboriginal
North End from the rest of the city. North End Winnipeg looks nothing like the idyllic,
tree-lined, middle-class neighbourhoods to the south. It is the poorest and most
violent neighbourhood in urban Canada. Many white Winnipeggers have never visited.
To Falcon-Ouellette, a Calgary native who moved to Winnipeg from Quebec City, it is
Canadas greatest shame.
The neighbourhood is home to two of the countrys three poorest postal codesthe
median household income in the North End is $22,293, less than half that of the wider
city at $49,790. The homicides that plague the city, earning it the nickname
Murderpeg and the countrys highest rate of violent crime, are a primarily North End
phenomenon. On a recent visit there, a Selkirk Avenue clothing storeone of few
remaining businesses on a strip crowded with social service agencies and boarded-up

storefrontswas closing for good. The area had simply become too dangerous, the
stores owner explained.
One in three North End residents drop out of school before Grade 9, leaving huge
swaths of young residents wholly disconnected from the labour market. One in six
children are apprehended by Manitobas Child and Family Services. Girls as young as
11 or 12 routinely work the stroll. On North Main Street, traffic slows to a stall when
intoxicated residents stumble across the street. Solvent abuse is as common as
alcoholism here, and rising. Even in Decembers cold, kids as young as nine clutch gassoaked rags; some have begun stuffing them directly into their mouths for a more
powerful high.
I used to tell myself I wouldnt live to see my sweet 16, says 24-year-old Jenna Wirch.
I was sure I was going to die before then. Both Wirchs sisters committed suicide
when they were growing up. Four of her closest friends have also died by suicide. One
hung herself in an alley using her dogs leash. She was 11. Wirchs mom put her to work
in the sex trade before her 10th birthday. She ran away at 11, then bounced between
the street and a long list of foster homes. One was a crack house. Two friends were
stabbed to death in front of her, one with a machete. This is a North End childhood.
The areas hospitalization rate for violence is almost seven times that of the wider city.
Within a year, roughly 20 per cent of youth treated for violence will be back in hospital
seeking treatment for another injury, says Carolyn Snider, an ER doctor at the core
area Health Sciences Centre. If that same number was quoted for stroke or heart
attacks or many of the other conditions we treat, there would be uproar. Snider, who
trained at the countrys two largest trauma centres in downtown Toronto, says she was
utterly unprepared for the degree of violence she encounters daily in Winnipeg. Much
of the violence is committed within the Aboriginal youth community itself. Thetwo
accused of the November assault of Rinelle Harper are Aboriginal. Just eight per cent
of Aboriginal women are killed by strangers; the majority are murdered by their
spouses or boyfriends (40 per cent), family members (23 per cent) or acquaintances
(30 per cent).
Jon C, of the Winnipeg Boyz, calls theirs the bruised generation: two generations
removed from residential schooling but still reeling from its effects. My grandmother
went to full-time residential schoolthe ones who were beaten and brainwashed, he
says. My own mother never lived with her; she never learned how to look after me and
my sister, to nurture us. He remembers sitting through wild, all-night parties as a
toddler. I remember my eyes just burning because there was so much smoke. He
stole food to stave off hunger as a boy. For a while his bed was a sheet on a cement
basement floor.
Its this sorry state of affairs that leads many in the city to look down on the Aboriginal

population, or to dismiss the North End as a Native-only problem.

Tyler Henderson, a 28-year-old Ojibway nursing student at the University of
Manitoba, says he feels racism every time he walks out his front door. Henderson says
Winnipeg police stopped him 15 times last year. You fit the description, police tell
him when he asks what he did wrong. Once, police claimed hed pulled to a stop a few
inches beyond the stop line. It makes me mad, he says. But theres nothing I can
do. Some young indigenous men are stopped twice per month in the inner city,
according to University of Manitoba criminologist Elizabeth Comack.

Rosanna Deerchild, a local indigenous writer and broadcaster, says that every few
weeks she is harassed. Someone honks at me, or yells out How much from a car
window, or calls me a stupid squaw, or tells me to go back to the rez. Every time, it still
feels like getting punched in the face.
Thats just a reality of having brown skin in Winnipeg, says Jacinta Bear, who manages
the North End Hockey Program. The youth program subsidizes registration fees for
indigenous youth and gathers used equipment loaned to players for the season. Our
team has heard it all, says Bear, whose husband, Dale, has coached the midget team

for seven years. Even opposing coaches and refs call our kids dirty little Indians.
Just keep smiling, she tells the kids. Dont give them the reaction theyre after.
Theres something not right in their lives and theyre taking it out on you. Bear, 34,
whose two sons both play for the Knights, takes pains to explain incidents like these
are becoming less frequent. Still, these are heartbreaking lessons to teach eight-yearolds.
The problem is far more insidious than childish taunts. A few years ago, the federal
government investigated claims that indigenous Winnipeggers were being denied
housing due to discrimination. The Canadian Mortgage and Housing Corporation
pulled together a random survey of Aboriginal renters. The results were damning. One
in three told the CMHC that after showing up to visit an available suite they were told
it had just been rented. More than 30 per cent felt they had been driven to
neighbourhoods in the core, where the poverty rate and the incidence of crime more
than doubles the wider city and jobs are scarce.
To Bartley Kives, the citys top columnist, white privilege in Winnipeg isnt about
getting the best jobs or promotions. It means not being worried your daughter is
going to be raped and killed because of who she is.
Winnipeggers engage in a bizarre dance, says city author and educator Joanne Seiff,
who moved to Winnipeg in 2009 with her husband, a genetics professor. They are
aware and sensitive to raceas long as the person isnt Aboriginal. In 2009, shortly
after arriving from Kentucky, she attended a neighbourhood potluck. There, some
guests launched into a scary diatribe against the citys indigenous population.
Ironically, she adds, the conversation had actually begun when guests began lecturing
her on the racism African-Americans face in the U.S. South. In polite society in the
Peg, no one would dare speak ill of gays, Jews or blacks. But thats not yet true of
Aboriginals. Ross calls it the final domino.

The North End Hockey Program subsidizes registration fees for Aboriginal youth; its
founders also hope to open a cooking school. (Photograph by John Woods)
Tyler Henderson visited Montreal recently. He felt like a weight had been lifted. Police ignored
him. No one eyed him suspiciously walking down the street at night. He felt free.
Institutions are meant to be colour-blind. Last month, Manitoba released its report
into the 2008 death of Brian Sinclair. The 45-year-old had sought treatment at the
Health Sciences Centre (HSC) for a blocked catheter. Sinclair was Metis, with a host of
health and social issues and a past history of substance abuse. Hed lost both legs to
frostbite on a bitter February night the year before. His landlord had locked him out.
Although Sinclair initially spoke to a triage aide at HSC, he was never formally
registered and was not seen by a nurse. As his condition deteriorated, he vomited
repeatedly. Still, no hospital staff checked on him or asked if he was okay. A janitor
who mopped up his vomit placed a silver bowl on the floor in front of his wheelchair.
On four separate occasions concerned patients asked staff to check on him. None did.
Finally, a security guard was prodded into checking on him by another patient. By
then, 34 hours after arriving in hospital, Sinclair was dead. Rigor mortis had set in.
Many staff testified theyd believed Sinclair was homeless or intoxicated or sleeping it
off, and not in need of care. Despite this, judge Tim Preston ruled last February that

the inquest would not explore why those assumptions were made, nor how they might
be avoided. The inquest would strictly focus on reducing wait times and hospital
overcrowding. At that point, Sinclairs family walked out. In December, they slammed
the inquest as a wasted opportunity. Stereotypes are at the root of why Brian was
ignored for 34 hours, said Brians cousin Robert Sinclair. Those stereotypes have not
gone away.
Don Marks, a Winnipeg writer, recently visited an ER with an indigenous friend.
Theyd dropped a painting, and the broken glass had cut his friend. Aw! a nurse
exclaimed in greeting them. Have we been drinking and fighting again? The nurses
assumptions were harmless, says Marks, who edits Grassroots News, an Aboriginal
newspaper. But this was someone responsible for treating Native people in our
hospitals. We all know racism exists in our health care system.
Several Aboriginals told Macleans of occasions where they felt they were not treated
fairly or quickly enough because of who they were. One, who had lacerations to his
face, arms and skull, estimated losing one litre of blood while waiting up to three hours
for treatment in a Winnipeg ER. He was given a towel to contain the bleeding. He
believes he should have been seen by a physician immediately and might have, had he
not been yet another young Aboriginal injured in a stabbing.
Understaffing and clogged waiting rooms cannot explain Sinclairs death. The ER was
fully staffed the day he died. Fully 17 staff members admitted seeing that he was there.
And almost every angle of Manitobas well-documented wait-time problem had already
been explored by government studies and media reports. To many Winnipeggersat
least to Aboriginal onesthis was yet another whitewash.
A few years ago, an inquest was held on the murders of two Aboriginal sisters whod
called Winnipeg police for help five times to their North End before they were fatally
stabbed. Operators believed the women were intoxicated; police responded to the
initial call, but didnt return again for several hours. By then it was too late. An inquest
into their murders blamed poor training. Racism and stereotyping were not
considered.

Robert Falcon-Ouellette, director of the University of Manitobas Aboriginal focus

programs. (Photograph by John Woods)
Other Western cities celebrate their First Nations heritage. Salish art covers the hoods of
Vancouvers police cars, strip malls, even its pothole covers. The Vancouver Canucks wear a
Haida whale on their jerseys. Fin, their mascot, beats a Haida drum; and the teams player of
the game dons a Haida hat. Major indigenous art installations dot the city (the inukshuk at
English Bay became the symbol for the Vancouver Olympics). The citys airport houses the
countrys most impressive collection of indigenous art, including Bill Reids Jade Canoe, once
depicted on the $20 bill. In downtown Vancouver, a new public museum devoted to northwest
coastal art recently opened. All of this is strikingly absent from Winnipeg, the indigenous heart
of the continent, despite a flurry of new public buildings.
In September, roughly one kilometre downstream from the site Tina Fontaines body
was discovered in the Red, the $351-million Canadian Museum for Human Rights
opened at the Forks, the sacred confluence of the Red and Assiniboine rivers. The 12storey mountain of concrete and stone houses just two major exhibits directly
addressing indigenous abuses. There are reflections on the indigenous experience
elsewhere.
Alongside a treaty encased in glass there is no mention of the reality for Natives who
agreed to its terms and resettled to reserves; there, they were barred from even leaving

without apartheid-style passes. They slowly starved as the bison they relied on were
wiped out. All this happened in the museums backyard.
Colonialism didnt just impact Aboriginal people, says Perry Bellegarde, the new
national chief of the Assembly of First Nations. It forever changed the way the
European population on the Prairies would see Aboriginals as a problem, never a
partner.
It is no coincidence that on a huge range of metrics, the indigenous community is
faring worse in Manitoba than any other province. Manitoba, for example, has the
worst school attendance record among Aboriginal youth of any province or territory.
And just 28 per cent of indigenous Manitobans living on reserve graduate high school,
fewer than in any other province. An Aboriginal boy in Manitoba is more likely to end
up in prison than graduate.
The province imprisons a higher proportion of its indigenous population than
apartheid South Africa did its black population. Sixty-five per cent of inmates at Stony
Mountain Penitentiary, a medium-security prison just outside Winnipeg, are
indigenous, the countrys highest Aboriginal incarceration rate measured by jail. An
indigenous Manitoban born tomorrow is expected to live eight fewer years than a
white boy born in the province.
These are neither Aboriginal nor white problems, says Kives: theyre a Winnipeg
problem. Until everyone in the city understands that the health and well-being of the
rapidly growing indigenous community is inextricably linked to the health of the city
overall we have a big problem.
In the next decade, one in three kids entering kindergarten in Manitoba will be
Aboriginal, says Jamie Wilson, treaty commissioner for Manitoba. All those kids are
going to enter the workforce, he adds. That cohort has the potential to shape the future
of the province. To Wilson, the question is simple: does Manitoba want to create a
skilled, educated workforce or an army of underemployed, undereducated indigenous
youth dependent on government assistance and services? Its an increasingly urgent
concern when roughly 70 per cent of new jobs require some postsecondary education.
Wilson grew up shuttling back and forth between his northern Manitoba reserve and
the beach: both his parents earned doctorates from the University of California at
Santa Barbara. Ten years ago, after serving as a Special Operations Ranger in the U.S.
Army, he returned to Opaskwayak Cree Nation, just outside The Pas, to serve as
director of education.

He couldnt keep qualified teachers on reserve. He doesnt blame them: If they drove
a mile down the road to teach at a school in the provincial system, theyd earn $10,000
more per year. The problems of underfunding have been well documented: federally
funded reserve schools receive 40 per cent of the funding that non-reserve schools do,
amounting to a per child gap of $2,000 to $3,000. Many reserve schools dont have
libraries. One in three doesnt even have running water.
But since Tina Fontaines murder, the ground has suddenly begun to shift in Winnipeg.
A vigil held in her memory was one of the most remarkable and massive in
Winnipegs history, according to Niigaan Sinclair, who called it a turning point in
ethnic relations. Hed never seen so many white faces at an Aboriginal event before.
Winnipeggers, for perhaps the first time, saw Tina as their own.
Somehow, she opened peoples eyes[people] whod been trying so hard to keep
them shut, says social activist Nolle DePape.
The city certainly does not want for organizations trying to help indigenous
Winnipeggers. But a new generation of remarkable young activists is taking matters
into their own hands. Meet Me at the Belltower, a one-time rally to take back the North
End, has become a weekly call to action: every Friday, families and young people
gather at the Selkirk Avenue belltower in the heart of the North End to demonstrate
against violence. The event was launched by Michael Champagne, a dynamic, 27-yearold TED Talk veteran never seen without at least a half-dozen young acolytes.
Champagne is like the Pied Piper of the neighbourhood, empowering a generation of
indigenous kids.
Every Sunday, Althea Guiboche, a Cree mother of seven known as the bannock lady,
can be found feeding 300 hot chili and bannock meals on North Main. The Bears,
meanwhile, are building on the success of the North End Hockey Program and hope to
launch a program for teen girls and a cooking school for at-risk indigenous youth later
this year.
Two months after Tina Fontaines vigil, almost to the day, Winnipeg elected Bowman
mayor. Just before his official swearing-in, on Nov. 4, Bowman made a last-minute
addition to his speech. He chose to open by acknowledging that council had gathered
on Treaty 1 land, and in the traditional territory of the Metis Nation, a simple, but
deeply moving nod.

Photograph by John Woods

It has become tradition when delivering a speech in Vancouver to acknowledge and give thanks
to the Coast Salish, whose traditional territories cover the city; but this had never been done at
Winnipeg City Hall before. The incoming mayor, a Jets fan who arrived in office with little but
a game-used Mark Scheifele stick (he was scared his kids were going to put it through the
living room window if he left it at home) was uncharacteristically emotional and choked up
delivering the message.
I see a real opportunity right nowwith the level of engagement over these very
serious and difficult issuesto make a difference, Bowman told Macleans. If my own
familys heritage can assist in building bridges in various communities in Winnipeg,
then thats an opportunity I fully intend on leveraging. I want to do everything I can.
A month later, on Dec. 5, the citys police chief, Devon Clunis, delivered more
surprising remarks, calling on Winnipeggers to engage in a difficult conversation on
the citys ethnic divide. He asked residents to recognize white privilege, suggesting
their affluence resulted from historic inequity. Some people simply feel indigenous
people choose to be a drunk on Main Street or they choose to be involved in the sex
trade. No. We need to have those specific conversationsand try to understand why
those individuals are living in those conditions.

To Jamie Wilson, after Tina Fontaines death it was like you couldnt deny it
anymorethe racism, all the problems. He believes Winnipeg has begun confronting
these head-on. Right now, were stuck in a trap. Were going to have to acknowledge
it. Or it will forever hold us back.
Tina did this, says Thelma Favel. Tina opened even the governments eyes. It had to
take my baby to die for people to realize there was a problemand there still is.