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Originally Posted by vid
Every First Nation has a traditional territory that is used for hunting and fishing, and they generally put a lot of effort into protecting that. Reserves aren't large enough for sustainable hunting, hence the need for traditional lands. Essentially all of Northern Ontario is traditional land for one First Nation or another, and in cases where no specific first nation is claiming it, treaty councils like NAN and tribal councils like Mattawa generally claim it on behalf of all native peoples in the region. So basically we should always operate under the assumption that land in this region is First Nation Traditional Land.
I don't know if Timmins is doing it, but Thunder Bay usually starts every proclamation stating that we're in the traditional territory of Fort William First Nation, and we fly the band's flag at City Hall to represent that.
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Timmins isn't doing the traditional territory proclamation at council meetings yet. And no Indigenous flag of any type is flown at city hall. It was only about 5 or 6 years ago that our city hall started flying the Franco-Ontarian flag! I'm sure it won't be long. But here we don't have any nearby First Nations but about 15% of the population is Indigenous. Most moved here from up North but there are a lot being born here now.
But I just read our mayor's state of the city address from this year and he did start off with acknowledging that Timmins is on the traditional territory of the Mattagami First Nation. The actual First Nation reserve is located just North of Gogama, about an hour's drive South of Timmins just off Hwy 144. But historically their territory was from between the watershed (just South of Gogama) North to just North of where Timmins is with the Mattagami River being the main travel route.