The Attorney General of Ontario selected Ganohkwasra’s Sexual Violence Healing Center, as a recipient of the Attorney General’s Victim Services Award of Distinction for 2020-21.
The award recognizes the dedication and creativity of professionals and volunteers who serve victims, and the courageous efforts of individuals who have been personally impacted by crime and are now working to raise the profile of victims’ issues in Ontario. 
SNGR announced the award Tuesday, acknowledging the work the Ganohkwasra team does for the community, saying the award is a well-deserved recognition of efforts the organization makes to provide support and counselling to individuals and their families.

Six Nations of the Grand River Elected Chief Mark Hill is calling on the community to unify — saying hereditary and elected leaders need to listen to the voices in the community seeking the two bodies to work together.
Hill pointed to the recent federal budget announcement, promising $18 billion for Indigenous initiatives across the country. Hill says community leadership need to collaboratively hold Canada and Ontario accountable and pursue funding to care for elders, language programming and waterline hookups — specifically pointing to funding for a new building for the language-immersion school Kawenni:io/Gaweni:yo.
He said Six Nations leaders will be engaging with the federal government to pursue funding for the new school building.

Five First Nations and three coal companies have written the Alberta government to ask for better Indigenous consultation on proposed mines in the Rocky Mountains.
The United Conservative government wants to expand the industry and land belonging to the First Nations spans most of the area being considered for coal exploration.
The coal companies involved with the letter are Cabin Ridge, Montem Resources and Benga Mining, which currently has a project before a federal-provincial regulatory panel.
The First Nations say the province’s planned meetings with regional chiefs are nowhere near the level of consultation such a significant change to the land requires.

The British Columbia Supreme Court has rejected a bid to quash the extension of the environmental assessment certificate for the natural gas pipeline at the centre of countrywide protests in February last year.
The Office of the Wet’suwet’en, a society governed by several hereditary chiefs, asked the court to send the certificate for the Coastal GasLink pipeline back to B.C.’s Environmental Assessment Office for further review.
Their lawyers argued in part that the office did not meaningfully address the findings of the 2019 report from the National Inquiry into Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women and Girls when it approved the extension.
They said Coastal GasLink’s plan to mitigate potential socio-economic effects of the pipeline project did not address harms identified by the inquiry, which heard evidence linking the influx of temporary labourers for such projects with escalating gender-based violence.

Retired Sen. Murray Sinclair has been named the next chancellor of Queen’s University.
The Kingston, Ontario school says it finalized the selection on Wednesday, completing a search process that began in fall 2020.
He will begin in the role on July 1.
Sinclair, an Anishinaabe and a member of the Peguis First Nation, served as the first Indigenous judge in Manitoba and the second in Canada.
He led the Truth and Reconciliation Commission, which documented the history of residential schools in Canada and issued 94 calls to action to promote reconciliation between Canada and Indigenous peoples.
Sinclair was appointed to the Senate of Canada in 2016 and served as a Senator until January 2021.