Kahnawake – On Ohiarí:ha/June 6, 2018, the Mohawk Council of Kahnawà:ke (MCK) announced that it will not appeal the Quebec Superior Court decision in the case of Miller v. Mohawk Council of Kahnawà:ke.

It was also decided to pay to plaintiffs the monies ordered in the judgment.

The decision to forego the appeal was unanimous, while the decision to pay the plaintiffs was passed 9 to 3, with Ratitsénhaienhs Billy Diabo, Carl Horn and Kahsennenhawe Sky-Deer voting against payment. Both decisions were made at the duly-convened Council meeting held on Monday, May 28, 2018.

“It is clearly in our best interests to move forward as a community and put this unpleasant episode behind us, as a community,” said Grand Chief Joseph Tokwiro Norton. “From our perspective, the judgment was not a complete disaster – far from it, as a matter of fact. We agreed with several areas of the judgment, as we’ve stated in earlier releases on this matter. It was unanimously agreed that appealing this to another outside court would not serve our purposes.”

A total of $35,000 will be paid out to several of the plaintiffs, which is about 4% of the damages that they were seeking.

“The majority of Council agreed to pay the plaintiffs, though it was made clear that it is being done to avoid complicating matters,” Grand Chief Norton added. “If there’s a saving grace, it was that the amount could have been far worse. The concern was that, with these monies coming from our discretionary budget, these are funds that could have been used to supplement underfunded organizations and activities such as the Youth Center, Language & Culture, and Sports & Recreation. But we have to find a way to work around this.”

As a final statement, the MCK reminded the community to remain calm and respectful in matters relating to this issue and to conduct themselves accordingly.