A three-day conference held by the National Assembly of Remote Communities started Wednesday in Edmonton with the goal of having a united voice over access to resources.
“Many of our communities are given the short end of the stick in terms of resourcing,” said Bobby Narcisse, deputy grand chief of the Nishnawbe Aski Nation, an organization that represents 49 First Nations in northern Ontario.
“Many of our citizens have to leave First Nation communities to go to urban centres to have access to things like mental health, education, employment opportunities. All those different opportunities that are so readily available to many of our urban brothers and sisters.”
The assembly, also known as NARC, was formed in 2021 to unite remote communities across the country and help them access the same services southern community currently enjoy.
Narcisse said NARC was created with child welfare in mind to help with an equitable distribution of the recent multi-billion dollar settlement with the federal government and the long term approach to Jordan’s Principle.
“We are going to get a lot of input from the grassroots and the Elders and youth in terms of specific to the long-term reform of child welfare,” said David Pratt, first vice-chief of the Federation of Sovereign Indigenous Nations in Saskatchewan.
“So all that is going to going into addressing the remoteness quotient and the remoteness factor. Very important where the conversations will be having over the course of the next three days.”
