Full Name
Hannah Thibedeau
Job Title
Executive Communications Officer
Company
Global Public Affairs
Speaker Bio
An award-winning veteran journalist, Hannah Thibedeau has covered Parliament Hill for more than 20 years. She most recently served as National News Anchor of CBC News Live on Canada’s most-watched news network. Thibedeau and her team won the 2023 Canadian Screen Award (formerly the Gemini) for “Best Live News Special: Ottawa Occupation” for their coverage of the truck convoy in Ottawa in 2022.
Thibedeau has covered seven federal elections, four Prime Ministers, multiple leadership conventions, yearly Remembrance Day ceremonies, the first official National Day for Truth and Reconciliation, Royal Visits, and the 2014 shootings on Parliament Hill, among many others. During her tenure, she also reported on important international events such as G7, NATO and APEC Summits and Prime Minister Jean Chretien’s visit to Afghanistan.
Hailing from Yarmouth, Nova Scotia, Thibedeau has always had an interest in politics, news coverage and storytelling. She attended Dalhousie University in Halifax where she earned a degree in Political Science. Following university, Hannah wanted to combine her love of politics and media and went to Algonquin College in Ottawa and completed her Television Broadcasting Diploma.
Her range of skills and experience throughout the industry is extensive, beginning her career behind the scenes as technical support for hockey and football at ESPN2, producing stories for CTV National News, and as a reporter for Global National then reporting locally, nationally and internationally at CBC for all mediums: TV; radio; online; and, social media. Hannah has also spent time working as a reporter in Washington, guest hosting the National as well as Power and Politics and most recently becoming the anchor of her program on CBC News Network.
Thibedeau has covered seven federal elections, four Prime Ministers, multiple leadership conventions, yearly Remembrance Day ceremonies, the first official National Day for Truth and Reconciliation, Royal Visits, and the 2014 shootings on Parliament Hill, among many others. During her tenure, she also reported on important international events such as G7, NATO and APEC Summits and Prime Minister Jean Chretien’s visit to Afghanistan.
Hailing from Yarmouth, Nova Scotia, Thibedeau has always had an interest in politics, news coverage and storytelling. She attended Dalhousie University in Halifax where she earned a degree in Political Science. Following university, Hannah wanted to combine her love of politics and media and went to Algonquin College in Ottawa and completed her Television Broadcasting Diploma.
Her range of skills and experience throughout the industry is extensive, beginning her career behind the scenes as technical support for hockey and football at ESPN2, producing stories for CTV National News, and as a reporter for Global National then reporting locally, nationally and internationally at CBC for all mediums: TV; radio; online; and, social media. Hannah has also spent time working as a reporter in Washington, guest hosting the National as well as Power and Politics and most recently becoming the anchor of her program on CBC News Network.
Full Name
Laura Lee Langley
Job Title
President
Company
ACOA
Speaker Bio
PROFILE BY SARAH HAMPSON | PHOTO BY AARON MCKENZIE FRASER
Laura Lee Langley has been 'an institution' in Nova Scotia government. Now, she’s leading the federal agency for economic development in all of Atlantic Canada.
“For years, we were told we were the have-nots, and we were. But we’ve stopped thinking of ourselves as the kids with the holes in our shoes and we’re leaning into our advantages. We can create our own futures in ways that we never imagined before.”
“I’ve got another rodeo ride or two in me,” says Laura Lee Langley. After 27 years in the Nova Scotia government, where she was “an institution,” according to Premier Tim Houston, she planned to end her working days there. But then came the call to lead the Atlantic Canada Opportunities Agency (ACOA), one of seven federal regional development agencies, providing loans to small and medium-sized businesses in Atlantic Canada. She started as President in July this year. “The opportunity to look at the entire Atlantic region is very exciting – and the timing is right.”
Population and economic growth in the region continue to grow. As of Jan. 1, 2023, the total population of Atlantic Canada was more than 2.5 million, an increase of almost 80,000 from Jan. 1, 2022 (3.1 percent growth compared to 2.7 percent for Canada). In its most recent economic outlook, the Atlantic Economic Council forecast that GDP in the Maritimes would increase by 1.1 percent in 2024 and that Newfoundland and Labrador would register real GDP growth of 3.2 percent in 2024, both above the national rate of increase.
“We’re in a sweet spot,” Langley continues, much of it a result of the pandemic, she believes. “Because you could work virtually from anywhere, people started coming to these quiet places where you could have privacy, safety and beauty.”
Add to that an influx of immigrants from across the world — Atlantic Canada’s share almost tripled in 15 years, rising from 1.2 percent in 2006 to 3.5 percent in 2021, according to Statistics Canada. “It’s a beautiful thing,” says Langley, who has been recognized by the Nova Scotia Human Rights Commission as a champion of workplace diversity and inclusion. “When we’re welcoming, we’re providing opportunities, spaces for people to be successful.”
The longest serving clerk in the Executive Council in Canada, she has worked “close to the fire,” as she puts it, under three premiers for a total of eight years. Before that, she held senior positions in the government, including Deputy Minister of Treasury and Policy Board and Deputy Minister of the Office of the Premier, among other roles in tourism and communications. Her biggest lesson? “We can’t create public policy in silos. We have to do it in an ecosystem, in clusters of thinking, in ways that will provide a continuum” such as building long-term care facilities that over time could be converted to schools or vice versa.
Growth has brought challenges, she acknowledges. “For years, at least in Nova Scotia, all of our trajectories, all of our trend lines showed declining population. So we’re playing catch up with housing and health care. It’s painful. But we must have confidence in coming up with creative ways to solve the issues.”
Her belief in holistic policy development prepares her for leading ACOA, she says. “We can work together across the four Atlantic provinces, thinking about what we can do together rather than fighting one another for small pieces of the pie. “For years, we were told we were the have-nots, and we were. But we’ve stopped thinking of ourselves as the kids with the holes in our shoes and we’re leaning into our advantages. We can create our own futures in ways that we never imagined before.”
She sees opportunities in many sectors: the ocean economy, ecotourism, green energy, wind power, AI and ports in Saint John, N.B. and Halifax and along the Northumberland Straight, “where we can create advantages for those shipping into Canada and we can get goods to the Eastern seaboard more quickly than others can.”
Curiosity has been her fuel, she says. “I have never said no to an opportunity or a challenge even when I’m scared to death because I just always knew that I was not afraid to fail. I really owe a whole lot to that orientation.”
Born in Sydney, Cape Breton, she “grew up with humble roots,” the eldest of three sisters. Her father worked in the car business; her mother was a legal secretary. Both parents were committed volunteers within the community. She started out in journalism, working at a local radio station then moving to Halifax at the age of 22, where she pursued a career in television before switching to communications and public relations. A Masters in Public Administration from Dalhousie fed her interest in the intellectual and practical sides of public policy. “It’s about putting the citizen at the centre of the conversation,” Langley says. “I think that comes from my folks and the values that were ingrained in me to make me who I am.”
Langley exchanges information like a neighbour over a garden fence, offering insights as she sips coffee in her home on an early morning Zoom call. Asked about the region’s wariness toward those “who come from away” — not a helpful attribute when so many are moving to the area — she’s quick to say that “it’s an issue, and we’re going to have to really just whack it out of us.” It’s a matter of newcomers’ approach, she maintains: “If we feel you choose us because we’re special, you’re in. But if we feel you’ve come here to teach us or school us, that’s another whole thing.”
Laura Lee Langley has been 'an institution' in Nova Scotia government. Now, she’s leading the federal agency for economic development in all of Atlantic Canada.
“For years, we were told we were the have-nots, and we were. But we’ve stopped thinking of ourselves as the kids with the holes in our shoes and we’re leaning into our advantages. We can create our own futures in ways that we never imagined before.”
“I’ve got another rodeo ride or two in me,” says Laura Lee Langley. After 27 years in the Nova Scotia government, where she was “an institution,” according to Premier Tim Houston, she planned to end her working days there. But then came the call to lead the Atlantic Canada Opportunities Agency (ACOA), one of seven federal regional development agencies, providing loans to small and medium-sized businesses in Atlantic Canada. She started as President in July this year. “The opportunity to look at the entire Atlantic region is very exciting – and the timing is right.”
Population and economic growth in the region continue to grow. As of Jan. 1, 2023, the total population of Atlantic Canada was more than 2.5 million, an increase of almost 80,000 from Jan. 1, 2022 (3.1 percent growth compared to 2.7 percent for Canada). In its most recent economic outlook, the Atlantic Economic Council forecast that GDP in the Maritimes would increase by 1.1 percent in 2024 and that Newfoundland and Labrador would register real GDP growth of 3.2 percent in 2024, both above the national rate of increase.
“We’re in a sweet spot,” Langley continues, much of it a result of the pandemic, she believes. “Because you could work virtually from anywhere, people started coming to these quiet places where you could have privacy, safety and beauty.”
Add to that an influx of immigrants from across the world — Atlantic Canada’s share almost tripled in 15 years, rising from 1.2 percent in 2006 to 3.5 percent in 2021, according to Statistics Canada. “It’s a beautiful thing,” says Langley, who has been recognized by the Nova Scotia Human Rights Commission as a champion of workplace diversity and inclusion. “When we’re welcoming, we’re providing opportunities, spaces for people to be successful.”
The longest serving clerk in the Executive Council in Canada, she has worked “close to the fire,” as she puts it, under three premiers for a total of eight years. Before that, she held senior positions in the government, including Deputy Minister of Treasury and Policy Board and Deputy Minister of the Office of the Premier, among other roles in tourism and communications. Her biggest lesson? “We can’t create public policy in silos. We have to do it in an ecosystem, in clusters of thinking, in ways that will provide a continuum” such as building long-term care facilities that over time could be converted to schools or vice versa.
Growth has brought challenges, she acknowledges. “For years, at least in Nova Scotia, all of our trajectories, all of our trend lines showed declining population. So we’re playing catch up with housing and health care. It’s painful. But we must have confidence in coming up with creative ways to solve the issues.”
Her belief in holistic policy development prepares her for leading ACOA, she says. “We can work together across the four Atlantic provinces, thinking about what we can do together rather than fighting one another for small pieces of the pie. “For years, we were told we were the have-nots, and we were. But we’ve stopped thinking of ourselves as the kids with the holes in our shoes and we’re leaning into our advantages. We can create our own futures in ways that we never imagined before.”
She sees opportunities in many sectors: the ocean economy, ecotourism, green energy, wind power, AI and ports in Saint John, N.B. and Halifax and along the Northumberland Straight, “where we can create advantages for those shipping into Canada and we can get goods to the Eastern seaboard more quickly than others can.”
Curiosity has been her fuel, she says. “I have never said no to an opportunity or a challenge even when I’m scared to death because I just always knew that I was not afraid to fail. I really owe a whole lot to that orientation.”
Born in Sydney, Cape Breton, she “grew up with humble roots,” the eldest of three sisters. Her father worked in the car business; her mother was a legal secretary. Both parents were committed volunteers within the community. She started out in journalism, working at a local radio station then moving to Halifax at the age of 22, where she pursued a career in television before switching to communications and public relations. A Masters in Public Administration from Dalhousie fed her interest in the intellectual and practical sides of public policy. “It’s about putting the citizen at the centre of the conversation,” Langley says. “I think that comes from my folks and the values that were ingrained in me to make me who I am.”
Langley exchanges information like a neighbour over a garden fence, offering insights as she sips coffee in her home on an early morning Zoom call. Asked about the region’s wariness toward those “who come from away” — not a helpful attribute when so many are moving to the area — she’s quick to say that “it’s an issue, and we’re going to have to really just whack it out of us.” It’s a matter of newcomers’ approach, she maintains: “If we feel you choose us because we’re special, you’re in. But if we feel you’ve come here to teach us or school us, that’s another whole thing.”
Full Name
Anya Waite
Company
Dalhousie University
Speaker Bio
PROFILE BY SARAH HAMPSON | PHOTO BY AARON MCKENZIE FRASER
Her career as an oceanographer has taken her around the world. Now, as CEO of the Ocean Frontier Institute, Anya Waite is leading an ocean-first approach to the fight against global warming.
“The ocean has been missing in the climate dialogue. The ocean holds global carbon, and it’s the ocean’s action of taking up and outgassing carbon dioxide that essentially mediates our progress towards our climate goals.”
During her childhood in Halifax, the ocean was a fearsome presence, a place of stories about loss and struggle. Storms pummeled the shoreline. Fog blinded seafarers. The Atlantic was unforgiving in its ability to kill and wreck ships.
She had yet to fall in love with it.
In fact, Dr. Anya Waite started out at Dalhousie University as a music student, studying violin, then switched to a double major in English Literature and biology, finishing up with honours in Forestry. “My career has been an interesting meander,” she concedes. It was as an undergraduate that she had an opportunity to do oceanographic research and fell under the spell of the sea.
“Suddenly it’s almost like the frequencies change” she says of her infatuation. “You’re seeing multiple frequencies of energy moving across the ocean. It’s so vast. I think there’s a music to it. It’s music in liquid form.”
Prepare yourself for the polymathic mind of Dr. Waite.
The award-winning teacher will talk about complex scientific processes in simple images. Carbon sinks in the North Atlantic are “like chimneys in the ocean, cool on top and sinking quickly into the deep.” The effect of melting Arctic ice “is putting a sort of Zamboni of fresh water on top of the North Atlantic and changing the balance of heat and salt and how those chimneys sink the big carbon repositories into the depths.”
At the start of her fascination with the ocean, “climate change was on the radar but only just,” she says. After completing a PhD in Oceanography at University of British Columbia, she received a prestigious postdoctoral scholarship with Woods Hole Oceanographic Institute in Massachusetts but found it was less about ideas than it was about sourcing research funds. “I wasn’t having as much science fun as I wanted.”
Next came a position in New Zealand, where she devised innovative ways to study plankton. “You collect this stuff, and you see, oh my goodness, this is the biological carbon pump!”
Her heart – and mind – returned to oceanography. She took a position with the University of Western Australia’s Ocean Institute where she was an environmental engineering professor. When she was a new mother – she has two children – she helmed a three-week “ground-breaking research cruise that changed my career” as one of the first female chief scientists. (She is also the first woman to co-chair the Global Ocean Observing System.) For 17 years, she worked at UWA, becoming the Winthrop Professor, a prestigious research position.
In 2014, recruitment officers called from the Alfred Wegener Institute in Germany. “We want your head,” they reportedly said. Luckily, she was fluent in German so off she went to become head of the Institute’s Polar Biological Oceanography section. Four years later, she received “a phone call from Halifax,” asking her to apply as Scientific Director of the Dalhousie-led Ocean Frontier Institute (OFI).
Founded in 2015, the OFI, a partnership between Dalhousie, Memorial University in Newfoundland and the University of Prince Edward Island, was led by scientist Marlon Lewis, one of the first ocean entrepreneurs in Atlantic Canada. With an investment of $94 million from the federal government together with other provincial partners and governments and a gift of $25 million from John Risley, a well-known philanthropist and entrepreneur, the total funding amounted to $220 million, positioning Canada as a global leader in an ocean-first approach to climate change.
“The ocean has been missing in the climate dialogue,” says Waite, adding that she and her family were keen to return to Halifax. “The ocean holds global carbon, and it’s the ocean’s action of taking up and outgassing carbon dioxide that essentially mediates our progress towards our climate goals.”
Observation is critical, especially in the North Atlantic, where ocean changes are happening first and fastest. The global ocean removes more CO2 from the atmosphere than all of Earth’s rainforests combined — 30 percent of it in the North Atlantic. “The water cools and it’s saturated with carbon dioxide that’s taken up from the atmosphere. It cools and sinks 2,000 to 3,000 meters, sometimes even deeper in to the North Atlantic, and then crawls backwards towards the south. This huge sink of carbon is called the Atlantic Meridional Overturning Circulation (AMOC). The AMOC is one of the critical pieces of climate circulation globally. If it fails, it could shut down ocean carbon absorption,” she explains.
Last year, the OFI launched the Transforming Climate Action program to boost data collection and analysis of the North Atlantic carbon sink in order to reduce uncertainty about the ocean’s role in climate change and deliver data science to policy-makers, scientists and industry. With a new $154-million investment from the Canadian government, the largest research grant ever received by Dalhousie, the program will enable improved climate change forecasting and climate adaptation strategies as well as develop new technology for measuring changes.
In recent years, the blue economy and ocean technology have ramped up in Atlantic Canada. In 2018, Jim Hanlon founded the Centre for Ocean Ventures & Entrepreneurship (COVE), a hub for ocean-related companies to conduct research and development. That same year, Canada’s Ocean Supercluster in Newfoundland, a catalyst for the growth of the country’s ocean economy, was created.
Why did it take so long for interest in the ocean to develop?
“We’re land mammals,” Waite offers. “The ocean is out of sight, out of mind. For many, it’s unknown and in some ways, unknowable. But technological advances have made it possible to observe it to make sure we’re not damaging the life support system that the ocean provides.”
Her career as an oceanographer has taken her around the world. Now, as CEO of the Ocean Frontier Institute, Anya Waite is leading an ocean-first approach to the fight against global warming.
“The ocean has been missing in the climate dialogue. The ocean holds global carbon, and it’s the ocean’s action of taking up and outgassing carbon dioxide that essentially mediates our progress towards our climate goals.”
During her childhood in Halifax, the ocean was a fearsome presence, a place of stories about loss and struggle. Storms pummeled the shoreline. Fog blinded seafarers. The Atlantic was unforgiving in its ability to kill and wreck ships.
She had yet to fall in love with it.
In fact, Dr. Anya Waite started out at Dalhousie University as a music student, studying violin, then switched to a double major in English Literature and biology, finishing up with honours in Forestry. “My career has been an interesting meander,” she concedes. It was as an undergraduate that she had an opportunity to do oceanographic research and fell under the spell of the sea.
“Suddenly it’s almost like the frequencies change” she says of her infatuation. “You’re seeing multiple frequencies of energy moving across the ocean. It’s so vast. I think there’s a music to it. It’s music in liquid form.”
Prepare yourself for the polymathic mind of Dr. Waite.
The award-winning teacher will talk about complex scientific processes in simple images. Carbon sinks in the North Atlantic are “like chimneys in the ocean, cool on top and sinking quickly into the deep.” The effect of melting Arctic ice “is putting a sort of Zamboni of fresh water on top of the North Atlantic and changing the balance of heat and salt and how those chimneys sink the big carbon repositories into the depths.”
At the start of her fascination with the ocean, “climate change was on the radar but only just,” she says. After completing a PhD in Oceanography at University of British Columbia, she received a prestigious postdoctoral scholarship with Woods Hole Oceanographic Institute in Massachusetts but found it was less about ideas than it was about sourcing research funds. “I wasn’t having as much science fun as I wanted.”
Next came a position in New Zealand, where she devised innovative ways to study plankton. “You collect this stuff, and you see, oh my goodness, this is the biological carbon pump!”
Her heart – and mind – returned to oceanography. She took a position with the University of Western Australia’s Ocean Institute where she was an environmental engineering professor. When she was a new mother – she has two children – she helmed a three-week “ground-breaking research cruise that changed my career” as one of the first female chief scientists. (She is also the first woman to co-chair the Global Ocean Observing System.) For 17 years, she worked at UWA, becoming the Winthrop Professor, a prestigious research position.
In 2014, recruitment officers called from the Alfred Wegener Institute in Germany. “We want your head,” they reportedly said. Luckily, she was fluent in German so off she went to become head of the Institute’s Polar Biological Oceanography section. Four years later, she received “a phone call from Halifax,” asking her to apply as Scientific Director of the Dalhousie-led Ocean Frontier Institute (OFI).
Founded in 2015, the OFI, a partnership between Dalhousie, Memorial University in Newfoundland and the University of Prince Edward Island, was led by scientist Marlon Lewis, one of the first ocean entrepreneurs in Atlantic Canada. With an investment of $94 million from the federal government together with other provincial partners and governments and a gift of $25 million from John Risley, a well-known philanthropist and entrepreneur, the total funding amounted to $220 million, positioning Canada as a global leader in an ocean-first approach to climate change.
“The ocean has been missing in the climate dialogue,” says Waite, adding that she and her family were keen to return to Halifax. “The ocean holds global carbon, and it’s the ocean’s action of taking up and outgassing carbon dioxide that essentially mediates our progress towards our climate goals.”
Observation is critical, especially in the North Atlantic, where ocean changes are happening first and fastest. The global ocean removes more CO2 from the atmosphere than all of Earth’s rainforests combined — 30 percent of it in the North Atlantic. “The water cools and it’s saturated with carbon dioxide that’s taken up from the atmosphere. It cools and sinks 2,000 to 3,000 meters, sometimes even deeper in to the North Atlantic, and then crawls backwards towards the south. This huge sink of carbon is called the Atlantic Meridional Overturning Circulation (AMOC). The AMOC is one of the critical pieces of climate circulation globally. If it fails, it could shut down ocean carbon absorption,” she explains.
Last year, the OFI launched the Transforming Climate Action program to boost data collection and analysis of the North Atlantic carbon sink in order to reduce uncertainty about the ocean’s role in climate change and deliver data science to policy-makers, scientists and industry. With a new $154-million investment from the Canadian government, the largest research grant ever received by Dalhousie, the program will enable improved climate change forecasting and climate adaptation strategies as well as develop new technology for measuring changes.
In recent years, the blue economy and ocean technology have ramped up in Atlantic Canada. In 2018, Jim Hanlon founded the Centre for Ocean Ventures & Entrepreneurship (COVE), a hub for ocean-related companies to conduct research and development. That same year, Canada’s Ocean Supercluster in Newfoundland, a catalyst for the growth of the country’s ocean economy, was created.
Why did it take so long for interest in the ocean to develop?
“We’re land mammals,” Waite offers. “The ocean is out of sight, out of mind. For many, it’s unknown and in some ways, unknowable. But technological advances have made it possible to observe it to make sure we’re not damaging the life support system that the ocean provides.”
Full Name
Chief Misel Joe
Job Title
Chief
Company
Miawpukek First Nation (NL)
Speaker Bio
Chief Mi’sel Joe, of Miawpukek First Nation in Newfoundland, negotiated with government, industry and business partners to help build a thriving community and success story
PROFILE BY SARAH HAMPSON | PHOTOGRAPHY BY TERRY DAY
“As a young man, I traveled across the country, and it was rough at times. But I learned many lessons. You have to earn respect, and you also have to be respectful.”
“What kind of Indian are you?” asked a young man in a rooming house when Chief Mi’sel Joe arrived in Halifax at the age of 16, looking for work and to explore life beyond his community in Conne River, NL.
“I’m a live one,” he replied.
“I thought we killed all of you guys.”
“Well, you didn’t get them all. I’m here.”
That exchange was the beginning of Chief Joe’s informal education in how to assert himself and promote the story and needs of his people, turning him into a beloved leader — the longest serving Mi’kmaw chief in Atlantic Canada — who stood up to government and church officials as he developed his community into a thriving success story.
He had left his home with $10 in his pocket because he felt there was little choice. There was no running water, no sewers, no electricity, no opportunity in Conne River. Across Canada, he worked in many jobs: ranch hand, truck driver, fisherman, underground miner, railway worker.
Ten years later, in 1974, he returned to Miawpukek First Nation, homesick for the sea. His uncle, who was Chief at the time, encouraged his nephew to get involved. He started training heavy equipment operators, pipe layers and pipe fitters, carpenters, plasterers and painters. “We wanted to build a community and have our people do it.”
Tragedy struck in 1982 when his uncle died in a car accident. “Very foolishly, I put up my hand” for nomination as Chief. “I didn’t have a lot of experience in terms of leadership,” he says. But he had determination — and a family legacy to uphold. Both his grandfather and his uncle held office as Saquamaw, or chief. Morris Lewis, the first appointed Chief in Newfoundland by the Grand Chief in Mi’kmaq territory, was his great, great uncle.
Soon after his election as Chief, he was embroiled in a confrontation with the Newfoundland government that would define his leadership. For 13 months, the community had gone without federal funding as his uncle was unwilling to accept the province’s proposal to take $60,000 for an administrative fee and to send in an “Indian agent” to oversee financial matters.
“I said, ‘I’m going to St. John’s and I’m going to try to get our money back.’ It was like poking your hand into a rattle snake’s cage and hoping that you don’t get bitten.” After some false promises, Chief Joe and others staged a protest. “We were told to be a good Indian and go home.” With others from his community, he decided to go on a hunger fast while still in St. John’s. Nine days later, the government capitulated.
Chief Joe, who has been recognized with a Honorary Doctor of Laws from Memorial University as well as an appointment to the Order of Canada, speaks about the injustices that Indigenous people have suffered with calm assertion and no trace of anger or resentment. “Sir John A MacDonald’s whole idea of creating the Indian Act was to destroy Aboriginal people,” he says matter-of-factly. He worked to reform his community’s education system, making sure “that the Church never got their dirty paws on our school,” he is quoted as saying in a previous interview. Now, they have an immersion program in their language and Mi’kmaq studies for high school students.
Through the years, Miawpukek First Nation, which has a population on the reserve of approximately 900, has built housing, a community centre, a clinic, a school and multiple businesses, including a craft store, gar bar, a senior citizen building and partnerships in the fishing industry. There have been mishaps. In the late 1990s, they invested in a fish business that went bankrupt, losing $3 million. Indian Affairs wanted to get involved but Chief Joe refused. “We got in trouble, and we need to know how to fix it ourselves.” Which they did.
Six weeks after retiring as Chief earlier this year – he retains the title “until he goes on his spirit walk” explains his assistant – he was asked to help World Energy GH2 with Project Nujio’qonik, a wind-powered hydrogen plant in Bay St. George. As strategic advisor, he will support Indigenous, government and community relations.
“As a young man, I traveled across the country, and it was rough at times. I had to fight my way in. But I learned many, many lessons from that. You don’t get very far by insulting people, by pounding on a desk. You have to earn respect, and you also have to be respectful.”
Read about the other Frank McKenna Awards 2024 honourees, Dr. Anya Waite and Laura Lee Langley.
PROFILE BY SARAH HAMPSON | PHOTOGRAPHY BY TERRY DAY
“As a young man, I traveled across the country, and it was rough at times. But I learned many lessons. You have to earn respect, and you also have to be respectful.”
“What kind of Indian are you?” asked a young man in a rooming house when Chief Mi’sel Joe arrived in Halifax at the age of 16, looking for work and to explore life beyond his community in Conne River, NL.
“I’m a live one,” he replied.
“I thought we killed all of you guys.”
“Well, you didn’t get them all. I’m here.”
That exchange was the beginning of Chief Joe’s informal education in how to assert himself and promote the story and needs of his people, turning him into a beloved leader — the longest serving Mi’kmaw chief in Atlantic Canada — who stood up to government and church officials as he developed his community into a thriving success story.
He had left his home with $10 in his pocket because he felt there was little choice. There was no running water, no sewers, no electricity, no opportunity in Conne River. Across Canada, he worked in many jobs: ranch hand, truck driver, fisherman, underground miner, railway worker.
Ten years later, in 1974, he returned to Miawpukek First Nation, homesick for the sea. His uncle, who was Chief at the time, encouraged his nephew to get involved. He started training heavy equipment operators, pipe layers and pipe fitters, carpenters, plasterers and painters. “We wanted to build a community and have our people do it.”
Tragedy struck in 1982 when his uncle died in a car accident. “Very foolishly, I put up my hand” for nomination as Chief. “I didn’t have a lot of experience in terms of leadership,” he says. But he had determination — and a family legacy to uphold. Both his grandfather and his uncle held office as Saquamaw, or chief. Morris Lewis, the first appointed Chief in Newfoundland by the Grand Chief in Mi’kmaq territory, was his great, great uncle.
Soon after his election as Chief, he was embroiled in a confrontation with the Newfoundland government that would define his leadership. For 13 months, the community had gone without federal funding as his uncle was unwilling to accept the province’s proposal to take $60,000 for an administrative fee and to send in an “Indian agent” to oversee financial matters.
“I said, ‘I’m going to St. John’s and I’m going to try to get our money back.’ It was like poking your hand into a rattle snake’s cage and hoping that you don’t get bitten.” After some false promises, Chief Joe and others staged a protest. “We were told to be a good Indian and go home.” With others from his community, he decided to go on a hunger fast while still in St. John’s. Nine days later, the government capitulated.
Chief Joe, who has been recognized with a Honorary Doctor of Laws from Memorial University as well as an appointment to the Order of Canada, speaks about the injustices that Indigenous people have suffered with calm assertion and no trace of anger or resentment. “Sir John A MacDonald’s whole idea of creating the Indian Act was to destroy Aboriginal people,” he says matter-of-factly. He worked to reform his community’s education system, making sure “that the Church never got their dirty paws on our school,” he is quoted as saying in a previous interview. Now, they have an immersion program in their language and Mi’kmaq studies for high school students.
Through the years, Miawpukek First Nation, which has a population on the reserve of approximately 900, has built housing, a community centre, a clinic, a school and multiple businesses, including a craft store, gar bar, a senior citizen building and partnerships in the fishing industry. There have been mishaps. In the late 1990s, they invested in a fish business that went bankrupt, losing $3 million. Indian Affairs wanted to get involved but Chief Joe refused. “We got in trouble, and we need to know how to fix it ourselves.” Which they did.
Six weeks after retiring as Chief earlier this year – he retains the title “until he goes on his spirit walk” explains his assistant – he was asked to help World Energy GH2 with Project Nujio’qonik, a wind-powered hydrogen plant in Bay St. George. As strategic advisor, he will support Indigenous, government and community relations.
“As a young man, I traveled across the country, and it was rough at times. I had to fight my way in. But I learned many, many lessons from that. You don’t get very far by insulting people, by pounding on a desk. You have to earn respect, and you also have to be respectful.”
Read about the other Frank McKenna Awards 2024 honourees, Dr. Anya Waite and Laura Lee Langley.
Full Name
Maggie Burton
Job Title
Councillor at Large
Company
City of St. John’s
Speaker Bio
Newfoundland poet Maggie Burton is a multi-genre writer, professional violinist, and municipal politician. Burton holds a Bachelor of Music degree from Memorial University and has spent much of her career teaching with the Suzuki Talent Education Program and playing with the Newfoundland Symphony Orchestra. Chores was awarded the 2024 Griffin Canadian First Book Prize, received a silver medal in poetry from the Independent Publisher Book Awards, and was shortlisted for the Gerald Lampert Memorial Award. Burton writes and lives on the Avalon Peninsula, where she is raising her four young children.