Establishing friendly relations

Refugees arriving in Winnipeg have often settled in low-income and predominantly Indigenous neighborhoods. This has created the impression that residents may be forced to compete with their new neighbors for resources  already scarce. In one instance in 2017  Indigenous children pepper-sprayed  young refugees outside the  Immigrant and Refugee Community Organization of Manitoba’s (IRCOM) housing facility, in the mainly Indigenous Centennial neighbourhood of Winnipeg. What started as a moment of conflict, eventually led to friendly collaborations between the Indigenous community and  newcomers.

Meet Jenna Wirch, an Indigenous woman from Winnipeg and a community development worker at IRCOM, who works with both communities. She is  the youth engagement coordinator for Aboriginal Youth Opportunities, an organization working in Winnipeg’s North End.

Wirch understands the resentment  generated between  the two communities, but firmly believes that they cannot allow themselves to become “pitted against each other” as a result of  the actions of the government. A  shared colonial history is an  area of common ground to focus on: “Damn, we’ve all been colonized by the British,” she said.

 One of Wirch’s newest projects is a neighborhood patrol made up of  refugees and Indigenous communities, which aims to increase  safety while  giving residents a stake in their community. The project builds on a strong tradition of neighborhood patrols in Indigenous communities.

James Favel, executive director of the Bear Clan Patrol-- an Indigenous group in Winnipeg that focuses on conflict resolution and de-escalation-- found himself mediating  tensions between local Indigenous and refugee communities after a Syrian family’s home  was vandalized with hateful graffiti in September 2017.

When he heard about the vandalism, Favel visited  the  family, armed with a tote bag full of children’s books and granola bars. “I just wanted to go over there and reassure them that this was not representative of our community,” he said.

Favel increased Bear Clan patrols in the area, and a few weeks later the group held a barbecue for the Hamrasho family. The family ultimately decided to relocate to a different neighborhood in Winnipeg, but before they left they reciprocated by inviting the Bear Clan to a Thanksgiving barbecue, which Favel counts as progress.