The Indigenous neighbours you didn't know you had

They're known by many names : Sudbury 817, one percenters, or Robinson Huron Treaty (RHT) annuitants who aren't members of the 21 First Nation signatories.

There's at least a thousand of them in what Indigenous Services Canada (ISC) calls a general list. They have status cards, live in the territory, receive annual payments from the treaty but don't have a community to call their own.

Some say being in this specific situation when interacting with other First Nations, government officials and the public can create confusion, with few people being aware of the existence of this group in northeastern Ontario.

There are three other treaties in Canada that have general lists, including Treaty No. 6 in Alberta, Treaty No. 3 in northwestern Ontario and Treaty No. 11 in the Northwest Territories.

Some people have landed on those lists because of previous Indian Act policies. Take the case of Greater Sudbury resident Lori Rietze. 

Her paternal relatives received treaty annuity payments in Nipissing First Nation until her grandmother commuted in 1936. 

Commutation is a process whereby an Indigenous person receives ten years of treaty annuity money in exchange for surrendering their status rights. 

"We think she might have sold her rights to protect my dad and his siblings from being taken to residential schools," said Rietze.

It took Rietze some 15 years to find the information she needed to reinstate her father's status with ISC in the early 2000s.

Although her family was historically listed on Nipissing's paylist, the First Nation told her they weren't on the band member list, meaning her grandparents and great grandparents would visit the community to receive their treaty annuity but were not formally part of it.

Rietze's search to find her paternal relatives' exact community of origin was inconclusive, although she did find family members in several communities, including Temagami, Nipissing and Pikwàkanagàn. 

However these ties aren't enough to meet the requirements to be granted membership, and so she remains on the Sudbury 817 general list.

"As an 817, if you go anywhere, you're asked what reserve you belong to. I don't have a reserve," she said. "Where do I belong?" 

Rietze says being Anishnaabe without a specific community means having no common space to gather in for cultural and social events like ceremonies or pow wows.