Lodge takes Parks Canada to court over licence in Thaıdene Nëné

The owners of an NWT fishing lodge are asking a federal judge to review Parks Canada’s decision to refuse them a business licence over reconciliation concerns.

In May 2022, a group of five RCMP officers bought Trophy Lodge – which has hosted tourists on the eastern end of Great Slave Lake since 1965 – from Sutherland Drugs Ltd, owned by the Finlayson family.

While Parks Canada agreed to the new owners being assigned a commercial lease for the property in September 2022, the federal agency denied their application for a licence to operate a tourism and fishing business in February 2023, then again in May 2023, following a request for a review.

The owners are now asking a judge to overturn that decision in the hope of operating this summer.

At the heart of the issue is the lodge’s location, in Thaıdene Nëné, which was established as a national park reserve in 2019. The protected area is co-managed by the Łútsël K’é Dene First Nation, Northwest Territory Métis Nation and the federal and territorial governments. The Deninu Kųę́ First Nation and Yellowknives Dene First Nation also provide guidance on stewardship.

Thaıdene Nëné Xá Dá Yáłtı, the operational management board for the Indigenous protected area, recommended that Parks Canada deny the new owners of Trophy Lodge a business licence over concerns related to its location within the Kaché region, an area of cultural significance to Łútsël K’é Dene.

“Granting this business licence in the Kaché area would severely compromise the spirit and intent of Thaıdene Nëné, the land of our ancestors, and the vision for this most sacred and important area that the parties are attempting to build together,” the board’s decision states.

Parks Canada ultimately denied the licence, citing reconciliation and relationships with Indigenous partners, as well as the lack of management planning, zoning and policy development for the Kaché area.

The lodge’s argument

At a federal court hearing in February, lawyers for the lodge owners argued the decision was unreasonable, procedurally unfair and unlawful.

They said Parks Canada placed too much weight on the board’s recommendation and did not adequately consider the owners’ interests and visitors’ enjoyment of the lodge. They said the owners were given no opportunity to meet with the board or decision-makers at Parks Canada to answer questions or make submissions.

Lawyer Sarah Hansen argued Parks Canada erred in determining that reconciliation superseded other interests when reviewing the licence application.

“The licence is not intended to address broader issues of historical wrongs and reconciliation,” she said.

Hansen asserted that competing interests in the area have to be balanced. While the owners have an interest in the historical significance of the site as the former Fort Reliance RCMP detachment, she said they also want to respect the interests of First Nations. As an example, she said, the lodge would not allow visitors to travel to certain areas during the August Łútsël K’é Dene spiritual gathering, and guests would be briefed on culturally sensitive areas.

“When you’re talking about how are we going to approach reconciliation, I think the Łútsël K’é Dene First Nation has characterized the Trophy Lodge wanting to go back to an era where there was no reconciliation. Not at all the case,” Hansen told the judge.

She said one of the owners is a member of the Tthets’éhk’edélî or Jean Marie River First Nation, and an employee at the lodge is a member of the Yellowknives Dene First Nation.

Hansen further argued it was too early for Parks Canada to deny the licence because a management plan for Thaıdene Nëné has not yet been approved. She said there was no evidence the lodge would not fit or be able to adapt to that plan.

Hansen alleged the Łútsël K’é Dene First Nation had a conflict of interest as it had been in negotiations to purchase Trophy Lodge, which ended in a disagreement over the price.

Thaıdene Nëné’s management partners, including the First Nation, appoint members to the operational management board.

“You can’t say that management of the park means you have to only run the lodge by Indigenous partners,” Hansen said.

She said her clients had suffered “a dire financial loss” due to the denial of a business licence and three long-term employees had been laid off.

Customers typically book fishing trips one to two years in advance, she said, and the owners are concerned that having to turn away guests has damaged the lodge’s reputation.

‘A new way of doing things’

Parks Canada and the Łútsël K’é Dene First Nation disputed Trophy Lodge’s claims.

Parks Canada’s lawyer, Adrienne Copithorne, said the case is important as it’s the first to examine Thaıdene Nëné’s shared management regime. She said that regime relies on a nation-to-nation relationship that diverges from how national parks have been historically managed, which excluded Indigenous people from their traditional lands and way of life.

“This is a new way of doing things and it attempts to address the mistakes of the past and to establish a resilient foundation for the future of our parks,” she said.

“Reconciliation is not just a name. Reconciliation … is a growing ethos in the way government will behave towards Indigenous peoples,” added Mary Eberts, the First Nation’s lawyer. “It’s not something that’s accomplished overnight.”

Copithorne told the court the case boils down to a disagreement about the weight placed on the board’s recommendation and the principles of reconciliation versus the benefits the lodge’s owners said their business would bring to the park reserve.

She said for Parks Canada, reconciliation and relationships with Indigenous partners are paramount. Given the uncertainty around future visitor use in the Kaché area, she argued Parks Canada could not in good faith issue a business licence for Trophy Lodge.

Eberts asserted Parks Canada had properly weighed the board’s advice alongside other factors when considering the licence application.

Copithorne denied claims of bias, saying board members do not represent the parties that appointed them and speak only for Thaıdene Nëné.

She said the fact the previous owners of Trophy Lodge had a business licence is irrelevant as that was issued before the Indigenous protected area was established. She also argued there was no evidence the new owners had lost income as they have not yet operated the lodge, while they have other employment and business ventures.

‘Kaché is where my heart is’

In court documents, the Łútsël K’é Dene First Nation said the Kaché region is at the heart of its territory, where many members were born, raised and buried.

The First Nation said Trophy Lodge is located near the site of an old village as well as the important spiritual sites of Desnéthcheé and Tsąkuı Thedá, or Parry Falls.

“It is in the Kaché area that I learned the Dënesųłinë́ way of life, our cultural traditions and important navigation routes that I now teach to young people,” Iris Catholique, manager of Thaıdene Nëné, wrote in an affidavit.

“Kaché is where I learned how to be the person that I am today and Kaché is where my heart is. I personally have many family members buried there.”

Catholique said the site of the lodge has a painful colonial history as the location of a former RCMP detachment.

“The RCMP detachment was established in this location because it was known to be an important area for the people of Łútsël K’é,” she wrote. “We believe that this was all part of a government plan to exercise control over our people and to dispossess us of sacred lands.”

Catholique said if a business licence were granted to Trophy Lodge, it would “compound years of LKDFN’s dispossession of their lands by colonial authorities” and make it harder for the First Nation to manage sacred sites.

Relationship plan

Thaıdene Nëné Xá Dá Yáłtı released a draft relationship plan for the Indigenous protected area last month and invited the public to provide feedback. The stated aim is to finalize the draft and submit it for approval by the fall.

The board said it chose the phrase “relationship plan” as the term “management” implies control and ownership over the land and separation between the land and people, concepts the board said are inconsistent with Indigenous worldviews.

Trophy Lodge is located within Zone III of the proposed plan. Areas in that zone “support cultural continuity and are managed as natural environments.”

The draft plan states that within Zone III, “visitors will have opportunities to experience nature and culture through outdoor recreation activities requiring minimal services or facilities of a rustic nature.” Commercial leases can exist in this zone under the draft plan’s terms, and motorized access is allowed.

The draft plan requires that visitors be accompanied by Ni Hat’ni Dene, Parks Canada staff or a guide from a signatory Indigenous government to visit the village site and sacred sites ranging from the south end of Artillery Lake to the mouth of the Lockhart River in Zone I.

Visitors are prohibited under the draft plan from accessing Desnéthcheé, Dzén Kı́n (Rat Lodge), Tsá Kı́n (Beaver Lodge) and Ɂedacho Tł’ázı̨, an island in Timber Bay where the First Nation says Gahdële, a powerful medicine man, is buried.

History of Trophy Lodge

The RCMP established a detachment at the present-day site of Trophy Lodge in 1927.

After the detachment closed, the Finlayson family purchased the buildings from the RCMP in the 1960s.

Today, there are still historical detachment buildings at the site. The lodge can accommodate up to 16 people in four units, alongside four staff cabins.

The Finlaysons were licensed by the NWT government to run a tourism and fishing outpost business at the site from 1965 until 2019, when the land was transferred to the federal government during the establishment of Thaıdene Nëné. The business licence was then renewed and issued by Parks Canada every year until the current owners purchased the property.

In August 2006, the Finlaysons were granted a lease for the property, through their business Sutherland Drugs Ltd, until the end of March 2026.

Every year, tourists from across the world travelled to the lodge to fish for trout, grayling and pike.

When new owners took over the property in 2022, they were required to apply for a new business licence. After being initially denied by Parks Canada, they have since re-applied.

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Correction: April 11, 2024 – 8:29 MT. A previous version of this article stated Irene Catholique is the manager of Thaıdene Nëné. In fact Iris Catholique is the manager of the Indigenous protected area.