We are not victims

Due to a systemic lack of support, combined with Intergenerational trauma, they are more likely to go missing, more likely to be targets of violent crime and more likely to be exploited. Many enter an ongoing cycle of poverty, struggle and abuse.

Witnessing the crisis firsthand in Winnipeg, home to Canada’s largest Indigenous population, Clan Mothers Turtle Lodge (CMHV) is building an entire village to provide permanent, year-round housing and traditional services for Indigenous women and girls seeking safe refuge. Project Nôhkom or “My Grandmother’s Place” is more than a home, it’s a place where Indigenous spirituality and culture merge with the right to free will, competence and a sense of belonging.

The Indigenous Reconciliation Fund (IRF) is contributing significant funding to the CHMV to support labour, trades and construction material costs. Women will be an integral part of the project end-to-end to ensure their voices are heard at the table. These women will have further opportunities to participate in skills-based training to help with construction and to ensure the space is created as a traditional, sustainable environment. It takes a village to inspire long-term change, so a project for women, led by women, will have an incredible impact within the community.  

For 18 years, CHMV has provided women with Indigenous land-based healing and critical services. As the number of at-risk women and girls grew, a collective of Indigenous women gathered in 2015 with a shared vision: protect those who need it the most and give them the tools they need to change their circumstances. Nôhkom will be lifechanging. It will be a cultural hub, a place to call home, and an end to the cycle of trauma Indigenous women and girls have faced for generations.

Archdiocese of Winnipeg