About
Our Truth and Reconciliation
Community in Bobcaygeon
Shifting perspectives: Re-imagining relations with Indigenous Peoples, non-Indigenous People and the Land.
Our purpose as the Truth and Reconciliation Community Bobcaygeon is to foster and develop respectful relationships among non-Indigenous people, Indigenous neighbours and the Land.
We encourage and support one another, and anyone who will join with us, in moving towards restitution and decolonization.
We are learning, educating and working towards reconciliation locally within the Settler community and in relationship with the Michi Saagiig Nishnaabeg.
We are actively engaged in learning about and honouring Treaties, both locally and in the wider Canadian context.
We continue to work towards restitution of wrongs as we respect the values and cultures of Indigenous communities.
Who are we?
We are a group of non-Indigenous people living in Michi Saagiig territory, who are learning about Truth & Reconciliation and have a sincere desire to make some positive contributions to promote awareness to other settlers in our community. Our backgrounds are diverse. We are educators, social workers, clergy, artists, IT professionals, social and environmental activists, coaches, labour unionists, legal professionals, massage therapists – retired and working.
How We Began
Sherry Hillman tells about the beginning of TRC Bobcaygeon in the story that accompanies her quilt square:
“Manoomin is central to TRC-Bobcaygeon’s history, especially its “creation story” and my own motivation in helping found the group.
In 2015 a conflict erupted on Pigeon Lake when lakeshore property owners were discovered ripping the Manoomin out of the lake with the permission of the Trent Severn Waterway / Parks Canada without consultation and in violation of Williams Lake Treaty First Nations’ rights.
Much of the cottagers / settlers’ anger was directed against Indigenous harvesters from Curve Lake First Nation (CLFN). With racist overtones the conflict was fanned by a Lakeshore Property owners group Save Pigeon Lake (SPL) who did not appreciate the aesthetics of wild rice and claimed (falsely) that it reduced their property values and impeded their ability to enjoy the lake with their speed boats & jet skis. This conflict brought back frightening memories of racist mobilizing by the Federation of Hunters and Anglers against indigenous hunters / harvesters from CLFN. (which was eventually resolved with the Williams Taylor SCC decision), especially when a prominent member of North Pigeon Lake Assn (NPLA) proposed that the cottage association support and fund a legal challenge against the CLFN harvesters.
My husband was on the NPLA Board and convinced them not to support that proposal, but we realized we had to do something proactive to defuse the conflict and defend Indigenous harvesting rights. So we reached out and invited a number of progressive activists in the town – many who had worked together in mobilizing against a Mega Quarry, some doing advocacy work around First Nations, some working with CLFN to protect the environment from encroaching development – to an initial meeting at the United Church. And fortunately the political moment seemed promising for such an initiative, as it coincided with the release of the Truth & Reconciliation Commission’s final report and Calls to Action. So that was how TRC-Bobcaygeon was created.”