David Thomas

DAVID THOMAS NAAWI-OODENA

Winnipeg, MA TEXT Pamela Young

Like a plant sprouting from rocky soil, an inspiring land-sharing agreement in Winnipeg has emerged from a pile of broken promises and legal battles. In 1871, with the signing of Treaty 1 at Lower Fort Garry, Manitoba, the Crown made land allotment commitments to seven First Nations that were never fulfilled. When the 65-hectare Kapyong Barracks site in southwest Winnipeg was vacated in 2004, it was initially turned over to the Canada Lands Company, an armslength Crown corporation, to arrange for its sale. In 2008 the leaders of Treaty One Nation, the umbrella organization formed by Treaty 1’s First Nation signatories, launched a lawsuit. The upshot of their successful suit is that 68 percent of the former barracks property, now renamed Naawi-Oodena (“centre of the heart and community,” in Anishinaabemowin) will become an urban reserve, with the Canada Lands Company developing the remainder of the site. Infrastructure construction will begin in June 2022, and when full build-out is achieved in approximately 15 years, Naawi-Oodena will accommodate up to three thousand new residences and 111,000 square metres of commercial space.

David Thomas brings lived experience, a designer’s skill set, and a readiness to be “a sponge for ideas” to his role as Manager of Planning and Design for Treaty One Development Corporation. Raised in Winnipeg and a member of Peguis First Nation, he was making $11.35 an hour in a bank job and supporting a young family when he enrolled in the drafting program at Red River College. He graduated and went on to complete a Master of Architecture at the University of Manitoba. With his daughter, Cheyenne Thomas, a U of M Bachelor of Environmental Studies graduate, he is now guiding final design stages of the Indigenous Peoples Garden in Canada’s Diversity Gardens at Winnipeg’s Assiniboine Park. He is also active in an international Indigenous designer’s network and was a contributor to UNCEDED, Canada’s official exhibit at the 2018 Venice Architecture Biennale. “As a First Nation person I feel that we had levels of communication and storytelling that we’ve lost,” he says. “As a designer, I’m committed to figuring out how we can tell stories, how we can express who we are.”

Thomas and many others in Winnipeg’s Indigenous design community—including Destiny Seymour, who is also profiled in this issue—were instrumental in producing the Former Kapyong Barracks Master Plan, released in March 2021. Like any contemporary master plan encompassing multiple blocks within a developed urban context, it addresses issues of zoning, circulation and community space. But unlike virtually any other, it proposes integrating wild rice production with stormwater management, incorporating public realm features highlighting the cultural significance of the cardinal directions, and designing rest areas where people can observe weather patterns, water quality, animal behaviour and plant growth.

Overall, the plan envisages an urban Indigenous space that expresses Indigenous values and highlights the character and history of the seven Treaty One communities. It lays the foundation for an urban centre that celebrates the rich culture and language of the Anishinaabe people, bringing together Indigenous governance, community, and economy.

Thomas notes that Winnipeg already has two small urban reserves. He has an office at Peguis First Nation’s 1.5-hectare urban reserve on Portage Avenue, which he says has “a sense of community that I’ve never really experienced before.” On Naawi-Oodena, he’s involved in everything from ensuring that buildings are configured to support the types of meetings that will take place in them, to providing technical support to the financial team. “It’s such an extensive project,” he says. “I can’t wait to see what it’s going to become.”

RIGHT The plan for Naawi-Oodena, a 65-hectare development on the former Kapyong Barracks site in Winnipeg, envisages an urban Indigenous space that celebrates the character and history of the seven Treaty One communities.