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Cultural Heritage Resources (CHR) Resource Stewardship Monitoring. Training Outline. Day 1 - Office Context Cultural Heritage Resources Forest and Range Evaluation Program Cultural Heritage Protocol Review and Checklist content Day 2 - Field
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Cultural Heritage Resources (CHR) Resource Stewardship Monitoring
Training Outline Day 1 - Office Context Cultural Heritage Resources Forest and Range Evaluation Program Cultural Heritage Protocol Review and Checklist content Day 2 - Field Assess the effectiveness of forest practices on the protection of CHR post-harvest
Day 2 Training Agenda • Welcome • Introductions • The importance of Cultural Heritage Resources to local First Nations • High level overview of the Forest and Range Evaluation Program • Overview of the Cultural Heritage Resources Monitoring Protocol • Cultural Heritage Resources Descriptions and examples • Instruction on completion of the CHR Checklists
Forest & Range Evaluation Program • Pillar of results-based resource stewardship • Are we achieving our stewardship objectives? • Is the legislation working? • Monitor Resource Value status and trends • Opportunities for improvement
Cultural Heritage Resources According to the (Forest Act) a cultural heritage resource (CHR) is an object, a site or location of a traditional societal practice that is of historical, cultural, or archaeological significance to British Columbia, a community or an aboriginal people. First Nations across BC will have their own definition. Of CHR.
Cultural Heritage Resources (CHRs) • Archaeological Sites • Physical evidence of past human activity • Pre-1846 AD • Protected by the Heritage Conservation Act (HCA) • Traditional Use Sites • May or may not have physical evidence of human activity • Of continued importance to a living community • Not regulated under the HCA, but protected by Forest and Range Practices Act (FRPA) • Combined (<1846 and >1846 CHR’s), represent a continuum of human relationship to the land and all included in FREP CHR monitoring.
Forest Planning and Practices Regulation Forest and Range Practices Act • The Act says that government can set a management objective for cultural heritage resources The objective set by government for cultural heritage resources is to conserve, or, if necessary, protect cultural heritage resources that are (a) the focus of a traditional use by an aboriginal people that is of continuing importance to that people, and (b) not regulated under the Heritage Conservation Act.
Application of FRPA in FSP’s • FRPA legislative requirements important and relevant to the consultation process. • Include sharing information with the FN regarding the FSP, and developing results or strategies (R&S) to address the CHR. • Opportunity for FN’s to inform the licensee’s of the CHR values to provide recommendations on how to manage CHR values • Cutting Permit/Road Permit application process follows the legally established R&S for CHR in the FSP’s.
Steps in the FREP CHR Monitoring • Develop a list of Random and Targeted cutblocks with known CHR. Ask local FN’s for targeted sites • Collect all existing background documents for each block e.g. SP, PFR, AIA, SAP etc. from FN’s, Licensee’s or RAAD, Arch Branch etc. • Complete FREP CHR Checklist Form A before monitoring in the field with all known info, including the planned management of CHR • Assess the management practices implemented on cutblocks in the field for known CHR’s and report on the effectiveness of the practices
CHR Examples Archaeological Sites Traditional Use Sites • Pre-1846 Culturally Modified Tree (CMT) • Pre-1846 Trail • Shell midden • Lithics (stone technology) • Landscape modification • Cache Pit • House Pit • Defensive Trench • Post-1846 CMT • Post-1846 Trail • Sacred sites • Significant ecological feature • Beaver dam • Bear den • Eagles nest • Wildlife trail • Resource gathering sites • Plant community • Fishing site • Hunting blind
Why Manage Cultural Heritage Resource Values? • CHR’s that consist of past, and present, human evidence of physical activity are Non-renewable resources • Evidence to support asserted aboriginal rights and title • The landscape as a “history book” • Of continued importance to communities • Direction from laws and court decisions • Protect the history of BC
What Informs CHR management? • Constitution Act (1982) • Aboriginal Rights recognized in Section 35 • Forest Act (FA) • CHR is defined • Forest Planning and Practices Regulation (FPPR) • Sets CHR as a government Objective • Heritage Conservation Act (HCA) • Protects archaeological and designated heritage sites • Court Decisions • Legal Precedence • Professional Reliance • Results-based STEWARDSHIP
Heritage Conservation Act • Administers the legal responsibility of government, industry and the public to avoid or manage impacts to archaeological sites • The HCA is designed “to encourage and facilitate the protection and conservation of heritage property in the Province,” • https://www2.gov.bc.ca/gov/content/industry/natural-resource-use/archaeology
Sites Automatically Protected by the Heritage Conservation Act (HCA) • Archaeological sites have physical evidence of human occupation or use before 1846 • Aboriginal rock art with historical or archaeological value • Burial places with historical or archaeological value • Heritage wrecks • Heritage sites of unknown age with a reasonable possibility of having been occupied or used before 1846.
HCA Offences & Penalties • Section 36 (1) of the HCA states that a person commits an offense if they contravene Sections 13 (6), 14 (1) or 14 (8). Under Section 36 (3) a person convicted of an offense under subsection 1(d) is liable: a) If the person is an individual, to a fine of not more that $50, 000.00 or to imprisonment for a term of not more than two years or both, or b) If the person is a corporation, to a fine of not more than $1,000, 000.00
Confidentiality • CHRs are potentially sensitive and/or confidential information • Ask First Nations and speak to your district consultation coordinator on how to best manage monitoring data • FREP only needs the location and suggested management strategies to assessment management • FREP does not need to know how or why the features were used by First Nation’s to assess management
FREP Resource Stewardship Monitoring FREP Question: Are cultural heritage resources being conserved for First Nations cultural and traditional activities? http://www.youtube.com/user/frep101
CHR Features and Archaeological sites physical traces of the past
Common CHR Types • Culturally Modified Trees • Cultural Material • Cultural Depressions • Cultural Trails • Traditional Use Sites • Historic Sites
Culturally Modified Trees (CMTs) • A tree that has been altered by native people as part of their traditional use of the forest. • Non-native people also have altered trees, and can be difficult to tell if a modification is of native or non-native origin. • The term is commonly used to refer to trees modified by native people during traditional tree utilization, and is used as such in this course. • There are many kinds of CMTs in British Columbia.
Importance of CMTs? • Have cultural significance to First Nations groups • Dateable features of traditional forest subsistence • Legal obligations to manage for CMTs during forest planning and operations (older CMT’s that pre-date 1846 protected under the HCA, and newer CMT’s post-1846 are regulated under FRPA) • Can play a role in determining aboriginal rights or title in treaty & land use negotiations • May be linked to archaeological sites, oral histories, and traditional use sites • Data collected from CMTs can confirm trail routes, identify travel patterns, settlement patterns, subsistence, seasonal rounds, and population fluctuations • Analysis of CMT data can correlate traditional use with past environmental and cultural events such as drought, European-contact, or famine.
CMTs Coastal BC
CMTs of Coastal BC • bark-stripped trees • stumps and felled logs • trees tested for soundness • trees chopped for pitch • trees with scars from plank removal • arborglyphs (e.g. face trees) • trees delimbed for wood
Saw cut stumps from industrial logging, 1860’s. Note flat surface compared to archaeological axe/adze cut stumps. CMTs were dated by coring nursing trees from stumps, giving minimum age for CMT.
Arborglyph Tlingit tree carving from Fredrick Lake, Yukon. In Faces in the Forest by Michael Blackstock
Arborglyph Watchman pole near Kitimat. In Faces in the Forest by Michael Blackstock
CMTs Interior BC
Archaeological sites Cultural Material Sites
Cultural material • Cultural material is any object that has been made or modified by humans. It includes objects made from stone (chipped or ground), bone, metal tools, and ornaments. • Stone artifacts normally predate European contact.