‘Do Indians have property rights?’ Former Alberta chief’s land dispute in court
STANDOFF, Alta. — A dispute between two families over land on Canada’s largest reserve is heading to court in part to question whether First Nations members have any right to the ground beneath their feet.
“Do Indians have property rights? That’s what we need to know,” former Blood Tribe chief Harley Frank says of his decision to take his battle to the Federal Court of Canada.
The former chief of the Blood Tribe says he has already been in a physical fight over the land on southwestern Alberta’s sprawling Blood Indian Reserve, which is home to 12,500 people.
Frank, 68, still had bruising around his eyes when he was interviewed recently at his home on the reserve’s edge, 250 kilometres southeast of Calgary. His broken left hand was in a cast.