500 Acres Returned to Kahnawà:ke

 


Kahnawake – 3, Ohiarihkó:wa/July 2018. The Mohawk Council of Kahnawà:ke (MCK) wishes to inform the community that Canada has formally approved the return to Kahnawà:ke of the final three parcels of land comprising 173.19 as part of the Autoroute 30 bypass.

With Canada’s ‘Order in Council’ 2018-0866, Parcels A, B and E have been formally returned to Kahnawà:ke with full Reserve status. All five parcels, comprising 500 acres, have now been returned to Kahnawà:ke. A further 200 acres committed by Quebec will be identified for return at a later date.

Parcels A through D form a single continuous lot along the northwest side of A30, while Parcel E is located at the end of the Old Chateauguay Road.

For further clarity these lands are once again part of Kahnawà:ke proper, under the full jurisdiction of the community.

When the Highway 30 extension was built between St. Constant and Candiac in the early 2000s some 700 acres of land was alienated from the Seigneury of Sault St. Louis Land Grievance. The provincial government and the Mohawk Council of Kahnawake agreed that the province would return the same amount of land to Kahnawake that was being removed from the land claim.

The land, comprising 500 acres, immediately north of Highway 30 that was congruent to the existing Kahnawake boundary was immediately identified to be returned to Kahnawake through the federal Addition to Reserve process.

However, in 2013 the municipalities of Chateauguay, St. Isidore, St. Constant and St. Catherine filed a lawsuit against Quebec to block the transfer of the land. Last August, the Quebec Superior Court ruled in favor of Kahnawake paving the way for the federal transfer of the parcels of land.

“While this is excellent news, we will now accelerate our efforts to address the issue of the remaining 200 acres with Quebec,” stated Grand Chief Joseph Tokwiro Norton.

 

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