May 31, 2013 - Phoenix Sinclair Inquiry

B.A. CYR - CR-EX. (GINDIN) MAY 31, 2013
D.L. ROUSSIN - CR-EX. (GINDIN)
S.E. TAYLOR - CR-EX. (GINDIN)
D.M. KNOL - CR-EX. (GINDIN)
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MS. KNOL: Yes.
MR. GINDIN: And you'd like to see more
collaboration between child welfare system and
organizations like yourself?
MS. KNOL: Absolutely.
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MR. GINDIN:
presume? All right.
All of you would agree with that, I
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Now, if I can ask Ms. Roussin in particular, you
talked about your organization being run by and staffed by
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all or mostly aboriginal people.
And what would be the
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significance of that? Why do you feel that's important?
MS. ROUSSIN: Well, I think that in the
neighbourhoods that we work in they are predominantly
indigenous and so it's very important that we have folks
who are represented at all levels of our organization,
having, you know, a board of directors, having staff, you
know, and then the folks that we serve are also aboriginal.
I think that our families go and interact with a lot of
other services and systems and just don't see not even one
indigenous person ever, and so you know, showing that we
can be the workers, too, I think is, is good role modeling.
I think that there's also a level of understanding that
comes with being raised, you know, either -- if you've been
raised in an indigenous community or an indigenous family
or indigenous environment, and some of our, our staff
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