Nuanced. - 201. Chief Gibby Jacob: Insights on Leadership, Land & Reconciliation

Episode Date: August 11, 2025

Squamish Nation Hereditary Chief Gibby Jacob to share unfiltered insights on leadership, reconciliation, land rights, cultural revitalization, and inspiring the next generation after 32 years on council with host Aaron Pete. Send us a textThe "What's Going On?" PodcastThink casual, relatable discussions like you'd overhear in a barbershop....Listen on: Apple Podcasts   SpotifySupport the shownuancedmedia.ca

If you don't know where you come from, how can you know where you want to go? Reconciliation is often talked about as something that's needed. Do you think real progress is being made? Money comes, money goes. We'll get land because that'll always be there. How do you digest what's going on with Canada and the United States? What I know, I don't own. I only know these things because of people allowed me to learn them. Chief Gibby Jacobs, thank you so much for being willing to make the trip out and share your time. Would you mind first providing a brief introduction?

My English name is Chief Gibby Jacob, and I'm from the Homaltestison Reserve. Capilano is the white man's name for it, and that is where Lionsgate Bridge. dissects our reserve number five. My ancestral name is Cockleton, and I'm one of the hereditary chiefs from the Squamish Nation and have been one since 2009, pardon me. And I only became the hereditary chief after my oldest sister passed.

And she was the first woman chief in our tribe. and it was a tough, tough one to follow her because she was just such a great, great person. And I'm the youngest of nine children, and two died before I was even born, one from rheumatic fever, a hole in the heart, and the other one, two months old, were from pneumonia. And so I was probably, I was the only one of my whole family who was born on the chumumumatoist and reserve, all the others, older ones, we're all over in the next reserve, over Ossala, Mission Reserve.

So I've lived all my 73 years within one block of where I live right now. Wow. And I paid for and built my own home when I was 25 years old. Oh, gosh. And I'm pretty proud of that. I was the first one in the tribe.

And so that's where I'm from. I'm, you know, and I will never, ever leave there, not even want them in the box, because they're going to put me in a ground there, so. Beautiful. I'm wondering, you've had such an illustrious career. Would you mind taking us back to the beginning and some of those early steps that brought you towards leadership? Well, as a boy, you know, I have always played sports and excelled at all of them. and all team sports. You know, I never played any individual sports

other than just at turning 55, I started golf. And I should have not started golf. It was fun. So anyways, a lot of my teachings came from being a part of a team. And, you know, that's all pretty much I knew from other than what my parents taught me, but the values and principles you should live by. So I played soccer at the highest level in the region.

I played lacrosse at the highest level, senior A, lacrosse, junior A, lacrosse. I played senior B for the North Shore Indians, which is my home team. And I never played basketball because I'd have probably followed out in the first two minutes because I'd just like to hit people. And so a lot of my interactions with people really came from, you know, I was usually the captain or co-captain of the team. And I've always been one to just tell people what I think. You're not playing good enough.

You know, you've got to try harder. We need you. You know, so give them the rough stuff first, then tell them what you want from them at the end. So you're always providing that I need you. we need you, you know, discussion. And where do you think that came from for you? Oh, the honesty. Well, my older brothers, you know, my oldest brother, he's 88 now,

and he was always a captain of the team. And, you know, I watched him as a young kid, you know, and how he interacted with everybody. He wasn't the loudest guy nor the bossiest guy. But he was, you know, tell you what he thinks. So I think that's really where it came from. And, of course, my dad was always, you know, king of the roost. And, you know, you always just said, you got to do this.

You got to do that. So that's pretty much where I got my teachings from, my siblings and my dad. Right. And leading up to Chief, was that clear from an early age? When did that start to solidify itself? Well, going in 1980, 7980, I along with some of my cousins, we wanted to change our governance structure. And in the beginning in 1923, July 23, 1923, our then chiefs and the elders and the matre decided that we were going to go from individual bands.

to become the Squamish Indian Band. Because what was happening in the lower mainland is that the governments were complicit with railways and municipalities for infrastructure works. They were taking our land. So it was the easiest and least resistance because we weren't the lords of our land. You know, it was a federal government.

You know, we still don't own our own land. You know, you're a lawyer, right? Yes, I have a legal background. Yeah, yeah. So, you know that we don't own our lands. It's held for the use and benefit of the Indians. Yeah. And so we really didn't have a say.

So we lost a heck of a lot of land and thousands of acres, Squamish Valley, you know, two reserves, 1,200 acres. And that's Pacific Great Eastern Railway was a part of that taking. It's the first place that there. lines hit the water the rail lines hit the water so wherever the first place is they want to put a port there so actually the first name of the town of squamish they call it squamish though is newport because that's what they wanted to put there that's why they wanted our lands they told us you know you can sell it to us or we'll expropriate it and we'll give you what we want to give you that was uh the nature of their negotiations

back in the day. So, knowing, you know, knowing the history fairly decently of my people, you know, all the things that were happening. And part of the governance change was in relation to, we have to go another level. And so a bunch of us young folks, I was about 30 at the time.

said we had a meeting of our people called a general meeting, we put a resolution forward that stated, we want to change from this system, which is a chief becomes a counselor for life. You know, and I went to a few meetings, and I watched the proceedings, and, you know, there was quite a few fairly old men there. and they were napping half the time. So I thought, there's something wrong with this picture, you know. We need some vitality in here. You know, we need some youth who are going to be dedicated to the people and, you know, the needs of our people.

Not that they weren't, I'm not saying they weren't, but, you know, we just needed a different direction to look and travel. And so we made that change. And so, you know, just going from my sports background to a leadership position, you know, I just basically took all of those things that I... All those lessons. Yeah. And when I speak outside of our community, and in my community, I tell people you hear through here, your ears,

process it through your mind. those things that become important to you what somebody says to you and they become a part of your truth where does that land your heart exactly so that's what you tell others

you know that's what you teach others whoever you know it doesn't matter what color age you know I love talking to the little kids because they're probably more attentive than old timers who are sitting there on her iPads and iPhones and you know missing half of what you're saying.

Well, anyways, I ran for council, and I was on council for 32 consecutive years. Wow. And, yeah, one of the longest serving of the more contemporary ones. And, you know, a couple more longer, but I loved being there. You know, I loved doing the work, you know, because I knew why I was there. You know, my role was to be there on behalf of the people. It was always that for me. You know, I just, you know, there's no glory in being a chief or a counselor.

Most of the time you're getting, you know, what on. But, you know, future generations will be able to look back and say, those guys did pretty darn good. You know, just the way I do, when I look back at the old council, of the day way back when, that was a smart move, you know, amalgamating number one, you know, into the Squamish Indian band. You know, that was probably the most strategic move out of any that has come to our people. And so my, I think my path was set from an early age to,

to answer part of your question was, you know, how did you start to think about being achieved? Just from my athletics, you know, and being a leader at that level, you know, and not everybody could be treated the same. You know, there was some prima donnas, and then there was just some good players, and there was good people. And not so good players, but good people. So you had to massage so many different types of things and people. And my oldest sister, I lost two sisters in six months from brain aneurysms. And my sister who was just two years older than me, she was the second one who passed. My oldest sister who was the chief was the first one.

And my mom had, I think it was five of us kids left, and she called us all together. And she said, you know, I love you all so much. You know, I love you equally. And I said, Mom, I thought I was the best one. Being the baby, right? She said, no, no, no, no, you're all the same. But anyway, she said, you guys are going to decide who's going to be the next chief. I'm not choosing between you.

So, you know, you guys make the decision. Work it out amongst yourselves. Pardon? Work it out amongst yourselves. Yeah, yeah. And my oldest brother said, you're it. Pointed at me. He says, you're the logical one to be the chief.

You're working for the people. My next brother, he's 85 now, 86 soon. He just said, yeah, I agree. And then my two sisters I had left at the time just said, yeah, we agree. So that was in 2009. Wow. Can I ask, just looking at where we've come and seen from the beginning, do you think real progress is being made? Reconciliation is often talked about as something that's needed, something governments need to do better on, something that people need to do better on. Do you feel like we've made a lot of progress since when you started on this journey? Yeah, when I first got on council, you know, we were trying to develop some land in West Vancouver says you guys are a part of our municipality and, you know, flip that, no, no, no, you're in our

traditional territory, you know, you're a junior government. You're nothing more than a junior government. You've got no say over our land. And what they said was, well, you're sure you can develop, but you can only develop what we say you can develop. Wow. And I watched the senior leaders like late Chief Joe Matthias. I don't know if you ever met him.

He's probably the most brilliant guy that I've ever known, or one of them anyways. And some of the other senior guys have been there a long time. They just went up one side of the mary and down the other. and we're going to do it. You know, what they tried to do is use the infrastructure against us, saying we're not going to let you tie into the water systems, the sewage systems, yeah, all of that stuff. And we just said, well, we'll build our own, you know, we'll develop so much, we'll be able to afford our own. You know, we don't need you.

Never needed you to start with, you know. You guys just came out because of the provincial government, you know, otherwise, you guys wouldn't even be here, you know, if Squamish had its way, you know. But, so anyways, you know, we went down that road and it was pretty interesting times, you know. But during my time and being at the most senior level in my side of the nation operations, I think we did nine agreements. Municipal type service agreements. Municipal, regional, because we've got three regions in our traditional territory.

Sunshine Coast, Squamish-Lilow Regional District, and then we've got the Greater Vancouver Regional District at the time. So we did all of them. It took us about a year and a bit to get them all done. and we had to really be cautious about not giving something that, you know, others go, how come you gave them that? Right. You know, like spoiled kids, right?

So do you think those relationships are, like, there's a different, to me there's a different energy to how people come to the table than perhaps in those early days? Is that true? Well, it's like there's more education that has gone to municipal. People are running from municipal and provincial governments, right? And that's thanks mostly to the Supreme Court of Canada. You know, it's hundreds of successful lawsuits that have been filed from this province. This is the most litigious province in Canada.

We've won more lawsuits here than all of the other provinces combined. And, you know, we just weren't going to take, you know, you can only do what we're going to tell you you can do. And that continues today, you know, that continues. today. I love your thoughts on that. This is an issue that I'm still trying to work through. I don't know if you've heard about bills 14 and 15 from the provincial government that propose a different approach to trying to push forward on major infrastructure projects. I haven't heard of no. The BCAFN, the BC Assembly of First Nations, has come out strongly against it and pushed back against David Eby and the work going on at the provincial level. And it's a tough issue for me to

square because the Premier of BC, David Eby, argues we're under a lot of pressure because of these tariffs. So we have to push forward on building our own economy and separating ourselves to a certain extent from the United States. The BCAFN and the Regional Chief Terry Tigi argues, well, you can't do that at the expense of First Nations engagement and consultation with us. And Premier Eby argues that's not the plan. this just gives us the tools to move forward.

And I'm trying to figure out what that balance is. Do I take a provincial approach and understand that the tariffs are going to have huge impacts on not just indigenous people, but across all businesses and across every British Colombian? Or do I side and focus more on how this impacts First Nation communities specifically? And I'm trying to find the balance. How do you recommend we think about these types of issues? It's a tough one because they got so many cards, right? But in a very simplistic view, you know, okay, you know, if you guys are going to push your head with it, we want 50%.

We want to protect our culture, our lands, our language, you know, all of the sacred spots that they continue to dig up. We want these things as a good faith. Right. You know, if you can't do that, then what are we talking about? You taking everything, we get nothing? Yeah. You know, that would be my starting salvo, you know, if I was sitting in negotiations. Right.

And, you know, I don't think they'd ever give that, you know. Yeah. But you start high and work down, right? Yeah. How do you digest what's going on with Canada and the United States right now? Same old, same old. You know, we're not in the game. You know, and I don't know if we'll ever get in that game.

much to my chagrin, you know, as I always ask myself, what is our leverage? What leverage do we have? We have rights, title, inherent rights, title, you know, we pushed for my nation. We push for land, you know, just for you want to make a deal, it's going to cost you. And money, you know, money comes, money goes. My nation at the time, we were burning about 70 million a year. So I said, well, you know, I told my team, I said, I want land. We'll get land because that'll always be there.

You know, we don't have to go scroungered for land to house our people. You know, it's all reserves. I don't know how big the reserves are around here, but ours are pretty small. My reserve, Capulano, was the biggest one, and Squamish is lower mainland. And it's only 525 acres. And we've got bigger ones up in Squamish Valley, but just about all of them are in the one-on-two-hundred-year floodplain. And you guys have faced that here from the Fraser, right? Exactly.

So for me, I'd always say that, you know, if there's going to be a deal made, you'd take one acre, we want 10 or 100, whatever it is. So don't give up ever on the land, because it belongs. you anyways and you know if you got to negotiate it you got to negotiate we bought land that was fee simple land you know we looked at the makeup of our land and most of it was in 45 degrees and more and that you can't build anything on that yeah so when there was available acreage and we could put it in as part of an agreement you know the province would pay for it we'd get the land they all we're doing is renting certainty you know and that's an important thing to remember tell them uh you know your time when when this is over whatever this is we want that land back

yeah so it was always a reversionary interest that we put in there oh important thing interesting the other piece i wanted to ask about we're hearing more and more from the federal and provincial government about trying to create economic opportunities and trying to grow our way out of a lot of the spending that I think is taking place both provincially and federally. You were involved in Bears Lear, and I think that provides a lot of inspiration to young people. Would you mind sharing the history of that? Bears Lear.

Well, my friend Gina, Gina Jackson, from Seychelt, she's such a great lady, very, very very bright. And I didn't have a heck of a lot to do with it and tell you the truth. But she asked me to attend a number of times to talk to the people who were getting nominated for the awards. You know, the people, you know, who are people, right? And you get nervous, you get scared. I could tell they were all scared when I first walked in there. There was about six of them. And I looked at him, I said, what are you scared of? They said, I don't know. Well, why are you scared if I don't know?

Right? If you don't know what's going to happen, you know, just let it roll, roll with it, you know. That's all I've ever done. You know, I spoke in front of over 2 billion people at the transfer of the flag in Turin, from Turin to Worcester, Vancouver. Right. And I was so ill. I got a virus.

The day we landed, I just got totally, didn't feel good at all. You know, and I just wanted to come home. I had to stay because I was doing the speaking part in the transfer, welcoming the world to our territory, right? Yeah. And did it our traditional way, the Colesailish way. We had a coin. in a cardboard box it was part of the whole transfer and so asked everybody to take that coin out this is symbolic of us inviting you to our territory and our country for the games and

you know it was i didn't say it all like that but uh you know basic that was a gist of it And the only ones who responded were the Maori from Al-Tiro, New Zealand. Right. They came to our house in Squamish, and there's probably about 75, 80 of them. And we welcomed them with a song, and their traditions are a lot like ours. So they responded. They did the hongy. I don't know if you know what that is.

I don't know. Where they rub noses. Oh, wow. Yeah. And a lot of our people got up. and, you know, didn't know what was going on, you know. Yeah. But, yeah.

So was I scared? I couldn't even see the guy standing next to me. There were five of us chiefs on stage, but there's so many lights like this. This is nothing compared to that, you know, just beaming down on you. So, you know, I didn't even feel the thing. You know, I just wanted to get it over and go lay down.

I just so sick. What does it mean to you to be able to see, from my perspective, to be able to see indigenous people start to flourish? We're starting to see the culture start to be revitalized, the language start to be revitalized, and people being able to be immersed in it, and grow in a way that I imagine 50 years ago would have been unimaginable to where we are today,

powwows being attended at records or numbers. What does that mean to you? What it means to me is people are in need, spiritually. If you look at medicine wheel, physically, spiritually, emotionally, and, you know, people are just looking for, you know, where do I find, where do I find these things? It doesn't matter what color you are. You know, people are in need.

There's more spirituality do you need it today than everything. If you look at with the bankrupt USA, they've got nothing left, fighting each other. I'm afraid they're going to have a civil war down there one day. But anyways, that bothers me. Absolutely. One of my last couple questions, are you aware of the book, Grave Error? No. Okay.

It's a book written by True North Media in regards to questioning some of the news. claims about unmarked graves, and it's a very difficult conversation. I've interviewed the people who's helped put that book together to get an understanding of where they were coming from, and their basic presupposition is that some of the claims are being a bit exaggerated, and that they haven't actually found the bones into Kamloops, and that that's their contention is that they did radar of the ground, but they didn't go and dig up those bodies. They don't have the bones to be able to demonstrate.

that. And the counterpoint from my understanding with to come loops is we're talking to our community. We're trying to work that out internally. Do we upset their bodies? Do we do that digging? And that's a complicated question for those communities to decide. And I'm just wondering if you have any advice or wisdom on how we approach that difficult conversation. First big problem I've seen in this whole thing is all of those kids weren't from those villages I had family who went to that school in the 50s. You know, you can't get to everybody, you know, who may have had a family member, go to that school.

And as we roll away from that time, more and more people pass, and whatever knowledge they had goes with them. So there was a couple of those huge issues for me. You know, who has a right to say, the chiefs and membership from Tekemploops? I don't know. That's kind of a rhetorical question. But, you know, for me, we always fought in Squamish, you know,

against anybody doing anything anywhere near graveyard. You know, if we knew what was going on or burials, you know, we wouldn't stop them. and sometimes they just continue to keep going. And I got so angry that one of the provincial guys we were meeting with them. I said, you know what I'm going to do? I said, you guys won't stop. I'm going to go in that big cemetery on 41st and Fraser.

I'm just going to dig somebody up. I don't care who it is. I don't know them. I don't know the family. So that's what I'm going to do because you guys are doing it to us. You can't do that. Exactly.

Neither can you guys. So stop it. Stop it. They did. You know, it just got to... You framed it in an important way. Yeah, got to hit them where it hurts, you know? My last question for you is we're seeing a lot of growth and a lot of young people wanting to take you on leadership positions.

What advice do you have for young people starting to take those leadership positions on? I would say talk to the vets, you know, the people who've done it in the past and find out the pros and cons of being in the leadership position because most young people don't understand that you're taking on a legal responsibility. You personally are actually liable for the decisions you make on behalf of your people. And, you know, I mean, that's just the legal side of it. And if you don't know where you come from, how can you know where you want to go? So you've got to understand the past in order to move towards the future.

And so that's the important thing for me. We've got an election coming up in September 25th for we had a council that authorized our. a custom election system to be revamped. So the guy who got the mandate, he just went further and further and further and further afield and, you know, passed what the mandate was. And it created a referendum and election law. And with your legal training, you know, changing a policy directive as opposed to trying to change the law is totally different.

of fish and they made it so difficult it was a 147 page document and I'm pretty intelligent guy but when I was going through it I holy crap I said I can't understand most of this stuff she'd go 10 pages in then it refers you back to section 1A bracket C bracket small two and you look at it I forgot what I was over here. Our people, narrow majority approved it. Time rolled along. A lot of things became apparent. You know, the guy who ran for chair,

and this is a chair elected by the people. Nobody knew that nobody ran against him. So he got in by acclamation and just made a mess of things. So our people just kept getting angry. And they come talk to me because they knew I was on council for all those years, and I'm a hereditary chief. To my responsibilities, even though I'm not on council, you know, to be responsive to the people in their needs, right? Yeah. So I wasn't really involved in the beginning to change this stuff, but the Matrix, you know, they come and talk to me about it.

I said, you've got to lead this thing, you know. You're the only guy. And I said, no, no, no, no, that's a wrong move. I said, what people will think is, oh, that Ghibie is just after power again. And, you know, I did my 32 years, and 40, including an employee, right? I said, Matrix, you got to roll with us. I'm going to stand beside you every step of the way and everything that I know is tactics and, you know, those things. I said, I'm there because I want to change this thing too,

but I'm the wrong person to look at running with this thing and be the face of it, right? But the reason I'm telling you about this election, I thought about it, thought about it, and there's so many young people that our elders don't know. I don't know them all. You know, there's family members who came back from Bill C.31, and their kids are now coming back. So if you don't know anybody, you know, you're not going to get any votes.

And there's some running. I don't know why they're running, because I don't know them, you know. But I went and I secured Chief Joe Matthias Center. I don't know if you've ever been there or not. It's on my village, Khomottsdison. And I secured a morning there. And what's going to happen is going to invite all the candidates in to come with whatever, you know, come to meet with whatever elders show up.

Right. So that, you know, it's going to be very informal. Hi, my name is, you know. This is my family. My family is this, right? And I always think of one of my other things I always use in the speeches. You could see this out of one or three ways. this is where we all want to get to, right? Exactly.

So, you know, that's, I really want our elders to have a sound reason for voting for anybody, not just because you're my nephew or, you know, that doesn't make any sense anymore. Because we're a billion, we're going to be a billion dollar business. Wow. We can't have people in there who have no qualifications on anything, you know? We just went through the exact same thing. where we actually hosted an all candidates meeting. People posted online why they were running,

what they were going to do differently, or what they were going to bring to the table, had people run on real platforms of what action they were going to take, and it was just so heartwarming to me because that's how we grow. You need to be able to say what you're going to do, then you get your three-year or four-year term, and you come back, did you deliver on what you said you were going to do instead of going, it's this family or it's that family,

or I only vote for my cousins, or I only vote for those people. Measurables. Yeah, that makes it very hard to grow because then people aren't being held accountable for the actions they're taking. And did you show up to the meetings? Of course. We've got a number of counselors that don't even show up to meeting. Exactly. And it's so horrible we've gone from face to face when I was there.

Now they're allowed to be on TV screens. Online, yeah. Oh, my God. Yeah, you've got to be here in the room. You've got to be. Those after-meeting conversations. Yeah, exactly. And then if the chair didn't like, didn't like you, you know, you only got a couple of minutes to speak,

and then you got no chance to reply after that. Exactly. You know, what a waste, you know. But anyways, the other thing I did was, and I haven't booked the room yet, but after that meeting with the elders, I'm going to book another morning or maybe a whole day at Chief Joe's, get some of our senior retired counselors and leaders, matriarchs, come to a session with all of the candidates. Yeah.

And give them the Squamish 101. Beautiful. And this is where we were. This was amalgamation. This was before amalgamation. You know, this is how we got to, where we were. We've done a chronology when I was running the show in my office. We did a chronology from amalgamation.

to that it gets about 10, 11 years ago we ended up, but, you know, could add another page on now. We're just, money isn't everything, you know, I mean, I mean, we've got a lot now, you know, and half the time people don't know because they don't understand how to read a statement, right, and, you know, where the money's going. Yeah. And then they kind of put it into graph forms. So much is going here, so much is going there. It doesn't tell you anything, except that the money's gone.

Yeah. And no accountability that way. That's one of my words to you is, you know, as a chief, you know, people are going to be looking to you for the big leadership, you know. And if you're true to what you say you want to do, they'll have you in their first. forever if you want to stay there, right? Yeah. But if they figure out, this guy just lying, blowing smoke,

you know, you won't be there very long. Agreed. And, uh, so that's an important thing. You know, I was always, I was always at every meeting, you know, even though people were going to give me crap. Yeah.

That's fine, yeah. I get, I get that, we all get that every meeting, you know. And one of our ladies got in council. and we're getting non-confidence and this is a meeting-to-meeting thing, right? We're just getting non-confidence to you. So I'd just like water off a duck's back for me, right?

And I've seen her hand go up and I looked over there. She's a couple of years older than me. I wonder what she's going to say. Why can't we just be friends? I just want to start out. Oh, she blames. So I told her after, I said, we're going to get this every meeting. I said, don't let it get to you.

You know, don't let it consume you. You know, they're not your enemies. They're your family. They're just blowing steam. I said, end of the meeting, everybody will be fine again. So I've gone through that. I don't know how many times, but, you know, it just is what it is. That's the way of our world in Squamish.

Beautiful. Well, thank you so much for being willing to share your insights. I look to individuals like yourself for inspiration and for wisdom, and I'm just so grateful to have been able to share this time with you. Would you mind telling people how they can follow your work? I'm doing a limited series documentary. It's called Back to the Fire. We have a website Back to the Fire.net.

It's really about traditional teaching. leadership and the teachings that, you know, people got, like I understand Stephen Point was here before. And, you know, he's just such a great man and his wife as well. And where you start from, you know, none of us were ever rich. You know, my parents, both my parents worked. My father had a massive stroke when he was 47, I think, just about killed. them, but he came back. My mother worked in a fish cannery, and that's the background we came from.

Everybody worked. My brothers and sisters, all of them worked. And so... Beautiful. And so how can people find that? Well, you can go online. It's not out in public yet. We went to CBC and to APTN to see if they'd give us a broadcast license.

Both of them declined. Wow. Yeah, I mean, the guy who we interviewed was Chief Bobby Joseph. Wow. Dr. Chief Peter Joseph. Right. Yeah. Anyways, they refused.

And they said, oh, it's a great project, but not what we're looking for. Oh, no. So we've got the Squamish one. We're probably about 80% done that one. And Tuna'a, Kinbasket. The Cranbrook tribe. Yeah. A couple of lady friends of mine.

One was a chief up there, Sophie Pierre, for a long time. Catherine Teneas, still a lead negotiator for the tribe. Yeah. And so I phoned him up, you know, told him what the project was all about. And they said, we're in. Perfect. And Stephen, I just talked to him on the way here. see him

and told him because he's one of the other ones I tapped on the shoulder a friend a long time him and his wife and we're still working on this yet

and I said we're trying to get funding to finish these two but if I can get more you know you're the next in my mind who I want to video for your life story

and things that you want to share things that I have here. I told my staff, I told I'm retiring. At 65, I've been around a long time. I said, my health isn't 100%, so you know, what I have left, I got a small family and I want to spend my time with my family. I said, but here it is. I said, you know where I live. You know my phone number. You need me

for anything? You come and just ask me. I said, because what I know I don't own. I said, I I said, I only know these things because of people allowed me to learn them. I love that. And so, yeah, some of them phone me, you know, and ask me some historical questions and thoughts about direction. Right. And I got a pretty strategic mind. Agreed.

Yeah. Well, thank you so much for being willing to join today. It's been an absolute honor. Yeah, pleasure. Pleasure to meet you. And good luck being a chief. See, um. Thank you.

I don't know. I'm going to be.