THEBACHA/FORT SMITH
When George Kurszewski graduated from high school in Fort Smith in 1974, he immediately stepped onto a career path that has taken him to many places right up until today.

George Kurszewski's work has focused on community development in one way or another. - Paul Bickford/NNSL photo

"Fresh out of high school, I was hired as a community development fieldworker for the Indian Brotherhood," he said, referring to the forerunner of the Dene Nation.

"That first job as a community development fieldworker kind of set a pattern for me," he said, explaining it led to a variety of community development work.

His first job involved informing communities about the Berger Inquiry into the proposed Mackenzie Valley pipeline, and preparing people to take part in that inquiry, especially elders.

In fact, he even made his own personal presentation to the Berger Inquiry.

"So since then, most of the activities I've been involved in were really related to community development in some way, whether it be one community or a region or the Northwest Territories, for that matter," he said.

Kurszewski noted he hasn't worked for the territorial or federal governments.

"The people needed people working for them, too," he said. "I mean there's no pension there, but there's certainly a lot of good food. I really enjoy my country food, so working for the people certainly results in a lot of good meals of country food. And, of course, I've had the privilege of practising my culture and even learning more about culture and history through contact with people and communities over the years on matters of importance to them. So it's been enjoyable that way."

Kurszewski, now a self-described 50-something, has a wide range of positions on his resume, including three terms as president of the Fort Smith Metis Council, organizer of cultural events such as community hunts and drum dances, and involvement in projects to construct log houses and buildings in Fort Smith and other communities.

"I've also been involved in political development matters, for example setting up the Northwest Territory Metis Nation framework agreement on land, resources and governance," he said, noting he was chief negotiator from 1996 to 2006, and before that was the first president of the South Slave Metis Tribal Council (now the Northwest Territory Metis Nation).

Currently, he is the negotiator and consultant with Timberworks Inc., a company set up in Fort Resolution by Deninu Ku'e First Nation and the Fort Resolution Metis Council to develop forest resources in that area, especially for the proposed wood pellet mill in Enterprise.

Kurszewski said all the work in his career can be essentially described as community development.

"When I left high school, I didn't have a particular career objective," he recalled. "I wanted to be helpful to people because outside of school my training up to that point was very much oriented around the injustices that aboriginal people up here were subject to."

Kurszewski noted he was very close to his grandparents, great uncles and other elders in Fort Smith.

"So I really valued the cultural aspect of my upbringing, and the community development work for the Indian Brotherhood just sort of flowed from that, a continuation of cultural activity," he said. "I've always valued that and continue to value that. I think it's undervalued and not given enough support, so I've worked on projects that are really geared to getting support to different aspects of aboriginal culture."

Kurszewski said one of his favourite roles was helping people learn how to build log houses.

"In fact, I built my own log house," he said of his home in Fort Smith.

Kurszewski even plans to return to spreading the knowledge of how to build log houses.

This winter, he incorporated a new log building company called Logworks Technology Inc. in Fort Smith. The company is in its early stages and hasn't actually started building houses, yet.

"I'm going to use that to facilitate my interest in seeing people take advantage of the resources they have in their communities," Kurszewski said. "There are trees all over the place up here, and those trees can be harvested and, if done properly, can produce really well-made log houses."

Plus, he noted that building log houses is a valuable cultural experience.

Kurszewski said he has tried his best over the years to be helpful in areas that are important to people.

"I certainly did see the human value of working for people and doing things that were helpful to families, to elders, to women, to youth," he said. "Because of that and because of my upbringing, I've always given high value to human needs and human rights."

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