Indigenous populations in Thunder Bay and Kenora may be undercounted. Officials say that's a problem

New studies suggest urban Indigenous population in two northwestern Ontario cities are significantly higher than what's been recorded in the census, and municipal officials say that means their communities are missing out on provincial funding as a result.

A study released last week byWell Living House, a Toronto-based Indigenous health research centre,projects the Indigenous population of Kenora is two to four times higher than the 3,595 people recorded in the census data.

KenoracitycouncillorMort Goss saidthe study shows there is a need to provide more funding for appropriate social service resourcesin his city of 15,000 people.

"If these numbers are that skewed from the reality that we're barely dealing with, imagine how difficult it is to deal with this when these numbers aren't even counted and we're not being funded properly."

The same researchers analyzed data from Thunder Bay in 2021and estimated the Indigenous population to be somewhere between 23,080 and 42,641.

New Statistics Canada data released earlier this month says there were 15,055 Indigenous people livingwithin Thunder Bay's municipal boundaries at the time of the 2021 census. When nearbyFort William First Nation is taken into account, along with other outlying communities,that number grows to 16,935.

Thunder Bay city manager Norm Gale saidtheconclusions in the Well Living House studiesreinforcelong-standing suspicions of municipal leaders.

"We're cognizant that it's quite likely that our population is higher than what is being counted," he said.

"We're advocating particularly on the police funding file to the provincial government for more funding because of that. But if our population is higher than what is being counted, there are several financial and social issues that arise from that."

Many provincial funding formulas for municipal services are calculated relative to population.

Gale says if the province was to accept higher population projections, it would trigger a substantial increase for other strained services such as social housing and homelessness, court services, transit, and programs under the Ontario Municipal Partnership Fund.

Northern Ontario municipal leaders who are feeling resource strain on their social services are rallying to have the province increase funding to recognize those people who spend long periods of time in cities to access services that are not available in their home communities but aren't counted in their official population.

In August, a Northern Policy Institute report analyzing homelessness, addictions, and mental health across the regionrecommended that municipalities lobby the province to codify what they call "northern service hubs," andcommit to providing additional funding for those communities.

"This [study] is the kind of information we've been gathering and continue to use toward our argument of how much funding increases we need in order to develop these northern hubs," saidWendy Landry, the president of the Northwestern Ontario Municipal Association.

"We'll take that to our conversation with regard to housing to the ministers we have a relationship with.I'm sure they're seeing all the stats that are coming out as well."

The census process that calculates the population, however, is a federal government responsibility.

In the nearly two years since Well Living House released its Thunder Bay study, no city department has communicated with Thunder BaySuperior North MP Patty Hajdu's office or Statistics Canada to advocate changing the census process or increasing the population numbers.

For its part,Statistics Canada confirmedto CBC News that it stands behind its calculations on Indigenous people, which does not account for mobility between communities.

"While other methods would count people who are temporarily present in a community, the census would count and allocate them to the dwelling in which they usually reside," the statement reads.

"For example, Inuit or First Nations people [that] reside in an urban area for part of the year such as those who come to Ottawa, Thunder Bay or any other urban centre for medical and other services would not have been missed in the census but rather counted elsewhere, likely their home community."

Dr. Janet Smylie has now led Indigenous population studies for Well Living House in six municipalities, including Kenora and Thunder Bay, along with larger centres like Hamilton and Ottawa.

She saidthe path to accurately reflect the number and experiences of Indigenouspeoples in the census data is to invest in Indigenous-led processes. That might include creating an Indigenous arm of census gathering, training Indigenous demography experts, and developing respondent-driven sampling.

"Reconciliation has to be about moving from conversations into concrete acts of restitution," Smylie said.

"I think Canada's a bit behind other globally-affluent countries like the United States, Australia, New Zealand, in terms of tangibly investing in a First Nations, Inuit, and Mtis workforce and tangibly investing in the infrastructure that would be required."