Pearl Lorentzen
Local Journalism Initiative Reporter, Lakeside Leader
A large portion of the discussion around restorative justice at a recent community meeting was connected to not enough Fetal Alcohol Spectrum Disorders (FASD) supports in Wabasca.
Bigstone Restorative Justice (RJ) works with people in the Wabasca area who have been charged with a minor crime, as an alternative to the regular justice system.
On August 6, Bigstone Restorative Justice and the Wabasca RCMP held a joint open house at the George D Auger Memorial Hall in Wabasca.
“Our goal when we got started was to reduce the number of people in court and reduce the number of people going to jail,” said Raymond Yellowknee, manager of Bigstone Justice and Public Safety, at the meeting.
RJ is open to anyone living in the area, not just on-reserve Bigstone members.
“The main thing we do is we help them get counselling,” said Yellowknee.
An issue regarding paying for counselling came up later in the meeting. A community member has a grandchild with FASD who was ordered to take counselling or addictions treatment. However, since they don’t live on reserve, they had to find funding to pay for it. They found the money through Jordan’s Principle, but the facility they were sent to wasn’t FASD-informed.
Several questions were raised about FASD at the meeting.
Debra Cardinal, manager of Bigstone Justice and Public Safety, answered the questions about FASD.
RJ tries to offer wrap-around services, said Cardinal. When they suspect someone has FASD, they help them get diagnosed in Slave Lake, and connect them with relevant agencies.
“We don’t have the resources here,” said the grandmother. “Sometimes we have to send them to a home” outside of the community.
FASD workers come to Wabasca from Slave Lake, said Janice Auger, M.D. of Opportunity, Family and Community Support Services (FCSS) coordinator. People looking for supports can also go to the HUB program meetings, which connects various agencies.
However, Wabasca doesn’t have a group home for people with disabilities, said Cardinal.
RJ also as a family mediation worker, that helps families resolve conflict and make child custody plans outside of the court system. RJ also has a firearm safety course instructor and helps people get their possession and acquisition license (PAL).
RJ is working on expanding its services to Calling Lake, and hopes to start getting referrals directly from the RCMP, instead of going through the court system.
RJ is also in discussion with other Bigstone services to see about collaborating more to better help Bigstone members.
Bigstone Justice and Public Safety also hopes to expand in other ways, possibly by adding community safety officers (CSO), which is similar to a community peace officer. The M.D. of Opportunity has added CPO positions, but hasn’t been able to hire anyone to fill them.
Whitefish Lake First Nation has three CSOs, said Yellowknee. He plans to talk to them about how it is going.