Funding flap keeps native boy out of Winnipeg school

Last Updated: Monday, October 29, 2007 | 9:33 AM CT

CBC News

An aboriginal woman living in Winnipeg says a city school division advised her to hand her grandchild over to Child and Family Services as a means of registering him for school.

Eileen Apetagon recently moved to Winnipeg from the Norway House Cree Nation. She has cared for her 13-year-old grandson for several years, so he moved with her.

When she tried to enrol the boy in school, she said, the principal told her that her grandson is not funded to attend a school in the division because his parents still live in Norway House.

Officials with the St. James-Assiniboia School Division told her she had two options, she said: adopt her grandson, or put him into the care of Child and Family Services.

"What she said was, the easiest way for my grandson to enrol at the school is to go through CFS," Apetagon told CBC News. "I said, 'No. That's not going to happen.' I will not allow my grandson to be involved with the Child and Family Services system.

"You know, this was very insulting," she said. "I felt a sense of anger and disbelief, like, I couldn't believe what I was hearing."

School division officials refused to comment, saying only that they were following the Public Schools Act.

Ron Evans, head of the Assembly of Manitoba Chiefs, said he's heard of similar cases. Evans is asking Education Minister Peter Bjornson to change the law.

"That policy has to be revisited," he said. "They need to be sensitive to our culture, to our cultural practices, when it comes to parenting."

A spokesperson for Bjornson said his office is doing everything it can to ensure Apetagon's grandson attends school as soon as possible.

The province will review the case to determine if any policy changes are needed.

CBC News

Drug den busted

By Chris Kitching

Four small children were inside an alleged drug den in northern Manitoba when RCMP conducted a raid early yesterday.

Police arrested a man and woman, and seized 130 rocks of crack cocaine and 213 codeine pills in the home in Norway House.

The children were turned over to Minisowin Child and Family Services. RCMP did not say what the relationship is between the suspects and kids.

Police said the street value of the drugs is in the thousands of dollars.

RCMP members from Norway House and Cross Lake participated in the raid.

Norway House Cree Nation residents George Ettawacappo, 50, and his 51-year-old wife, Dorcus, are each charged with possession for the purpose of trafficking cocaine, possession for the purpose of trafficking codeine, and causing a child to be in need of protection.

Both are scheduled to appear in court Tuesday.

Winnipeg Sun

Wife charged with murder in stabbing

Fri, October 19, 2007
By CHRIS KITCHING, SUN MEDIA

RCMP confirmed today that a 59-year-old homicide victim in northern Manitoba was stabbed to death.

Police said Leonard Richard William Muswagon died Wednesday as a result of multiple stab wounds he suffered at his home in the Mission Island area of Norway House.

His 45-year-old common-law wife, Gaylene Ruth Clarke, has been charged with second-degree murder.

Norway House RCMP continue to investigate along with the Winnipeg RCMP serious crimes unit and Thompson RCMP major crime unit.

Winnipeg Sun

Not Safe, Not Sound

Is a change in the child welfare system failing Manitoba's native kids?

Allison Hanes, National Post

Published: Saturday, October 06, 2007

The safety of a five-year-old girl on a northern Manitoba reserve has ignited debate this week about the vigilance of the province's child welfare system where foul play, abuse and extreme neglect have already led to the deaths of eight youngsters in care in the past four years.

The latest case involves a shy little girl who has endured more than her share of tragedy. In July her father was fatally hit in the head with a two-by-four -- a beating she may have witnessed. Her 16-year-old half-brother is one of the people charged with the murder. The girl may also have been sexually assaulted at age three. Another older half-brother, then 17, was suspected but not charged. The child has grown up in an impoverished household where drug and alcohol addiction were rife.

But when her aunt in Winnipeg, who is not Aboriginal, demanded the child be removed from this environment, she found herself locked in a three-month battle against bureaucratic resistance, ironclad confidentiality and cultural hostility. She was accused of racism and exploiting her niece for daring to question the motives of a system focused on maintaining the ties of First Nations youth to their communities.

Welfare officials have investigated the case and decided the girl was safe and should remain with her mother under the watchful eye of local child protection authorities.

Manitoba's Minister of Family Services and the province's Child Advocate took the rare step of speaking out despite strict privacy laws to reassure the aunt about the child's well-being.

And Marcel Balfour, the chief of Norway House Cree Nation, a reserve of about 5,000 where the girl lives, also insisted she is in good hands.

"All I can say is that the child is safe," he said. "I am more than confident, in terms of the processes that are in place, in terms of putting all the issues into context -- including these allegations that would have necessarily have to have been looked into-- that the child is safe."

"And I stand by the decision of the local childcare agency," the chief added.

But the aunt remains skeptical that a system that has already failed eight children will adequately protect her niece.

"They're stepping up and saying they will take responsibility at this point as a system, and they will do what they can to ensure her safety, so if anything happens to her, it's on their heads," said the aunt, who cannot be named to protect the identity of the girl.

"I said to them: 'Not one of you would put your children in that home. Let's pack their backpack and stick them in their overnight. You're not going to do that, are you? Not one of you will tell me you would let your children sleep in [that] house -- why do you think [my niece] should stay there?' "

The case has once again put the spotlight on a system where the welfare of the child is sometimes superseded by cultural considerations.

The Winnipeg woman first learned the heartbreaking details of her five-year-old niece's young life as her brother lay comatose in hospital in July.

Read More...