LaForme, senior counsel at Olthuis Kleer Townsend, a law firm solely specializing in Indigenous issues, was also instrumental in the First Nations Drinking Water class-action settlement approved last year. Appointees to the Order of Canada will receive their insignia at an investiture ceremony with details yet to be announced.

The world is "running out of water," Makasa Looking Horse says, and if we don't take action soon, it will be too late. Looking Horse, from Six Nations of the Grand River in Ontario, is one of the hosts of the Ohneganos Ohnegahdę:gyo – Let's Talk about Water podcast, which won a 2021 David Suzuki Foundation Future Ground Prize. The prize recognizes youth-led movements. It's a podcast created, the Suzuki Foundation says, to "engage Indigenous communities and disseminate research findings by facilitating meaningful discussion about water issues and climate change."

Six Nations is moving into phase two in its wastewater facilities upgrade. Six Nations Elected Council (SNEC) approved payment of a little over $382,000 for the project at its Finance Committee meeting on November 7. The project will replace a pressurized sewage pipe with a larger, 932-metre pipe through horizontal drilling that will connect the lift station to three lagoons. Replacing this pipe, which runs from Fourth Line to the lagoons behind the public works building will speed up sewage treatment.

The pressure was on for Rhonda Skye. Firstly, she was representing an innovative Indigenous-driven pilot program proposing a short-term solution to ongoing water quality issues on Canadian reservations, partnering the Dreamcatcher Foundation, Healthy First Nations and the Autumn Peltier Project. Well beyond that, the filter installation Skye was overseeing this morning was on her brother Scott General’s tap. “I’ll give her a shot,” Rhonda’s younger sibling laughed. “If she lies to me, I’m telling mom.”