First Nations Infrastructure Institute
This podcast is for First Nations leadership planning critical infrastructure projects for community and economic development. Recorded live at the First Nations 'Leading the Way 5' conference in Treaty 1 Territory – Winnipeg, Manitoba, October 4-6, 2022. Host: Richard Perry
First Nations Infrastructure Institute
Kathleen Stone, First Nations Financial Management Board
Kathleen Stone and her colleagues at FNFMB work hard to make sure communities have their finances in order before they tackle major projects, including new infrastructure.
As a CPA, she manages capacity development at FNFMB. And regardless of the project scope, she says mapping of existing community assets is critical to laying a proper foundation.
Host Richard Perry caught up with her at the Leading the Way 7 conference held in Nov. 2024 in Treaty Six territory (Edmonton).
LINKS:
First Nations Financial Management Board
First Nations Infrastructure Institute
Then I found every time the accountant would come in, I'd be like, what are you doing over there? And so I found I liked the spreadsheets, I liked the numbers, I liked , uh, not the touchy feely stuff.
Speaker 2:One of the key pieces in the community's long-term success is financial management, and Kathleen Stone helps make that happen. Welcome to the only podcast on First Nations infrastructure in Canada. I'm Richard Perry. I had the good fortune to meet Kathleen at the leading the way seven conference to learn more about her asset mapping work. Enjoy . Where are you from, Kathleen? Where's your home community?
Speaker 1:I'm from Broken Head Ojibwe Nation. I grew up in my home community, which is about 45 minutes north of Winnipeg in Manitoba.
Speaker 2:And you decided to pursue accounting? Yes. What was that journey all about? Where did you go?
Speaker 1:Well, my mom, growing up in my community, my mom was the finance administrator for my whole life. And then she ended up moving to the city to , uh, be a funding services officer actually at , uh, indigenous Services Canada. Um, and then I tried, actually went, went straight into university after high school, but for a different field. I was going for family violence, conflict resolution, sort of something more like what my dad does. And then I quickly found out that's not for me. I went back to work and then I found every time the accountant would come in, I'd be like, what are you doing over there? And so I found I liked the spreadsheets, I liked the numbers, I liked , uh, not the touchy feely stuff. <laugh> , yeah . Yeah . So , um, I eventually went back to school and I went all the way to become A-C-P-A-C-G-A Chartered Professional Accountant.
Speaker 2:And now you're with FMB?
Speaker 1:Yes. And so now I've been with FMB for almost four years. I'm a capacity development manager there,
Speaker 2:Which means what exactly?
Speaker 1:Uh, what it means is Nations work with FMB. They put in financial administration laws for a number of reasons, but my job is to help them implement or support them to implement their financial admin administration laws and ultimately achieve FMS certification, which is Financial Management Systems certification.
Speaker 2:I'm just curious and aside really, did you work with Bucking Cake , Magaw Nation on their foul ?
Speaker 1:Uh, no. So we're , uh, we have three re three regions. I'm central region, so I work with Saskatchewan Man, Toba Northwest Ontario, so I'm not sure if that one's in the central region, but either way I wasn't part of that one though.
Speaker 2:Yeah, far east in Nova Saskia . Okay. Yeah , just before you get to Cape Breton and Okay . Which is where member two is, which is a large big box unit . Ah , yeah. Cool . So Jason's niche obviously is infrastructure. Mm-hmm <affirmative> . And how important is what you do to some of the infrastructure projects that have been started and will be starting mm-hmm <affirmative> . In communities across the country? Mm-hmm
Speaker 1:<affirmative>. Um, capital assets in general are a huge part of financial management systems, whether that's capital plans for new infrastructure or new big things that they're doing in a community. But also , um, so the, the big stuff and then also the little stuff, having a capital asset register of all of the assets that a First Nation owns. Uh, so I work with communities to put those things in place so it's not only the listing of all of their assets, but also the plan over the next five years, the repairs and maintenance of that asset and eventual replacement cost of that, and putting that all into p into place. So really important to have , uh, not only the dollar value of all of that, but to really for nations to really own their asset listings, knowing exactly where that truck is. It's in Joe's Yard, he keeps it, it's red and it's a Ford <laugh> , you know, that kind of stuff. Like, as opposed to an audit listing that nobody that's at . Right. So,
Speaker 2:Well, that's a good segue into your Cadillac story. Yeah,
Speaker 1:Yeah, for sure. Not that long. I was working with the community on their asset listing, so we pulled out all of the documents that we had and we went line by line on all of these things. And , uh, one of the things I came up was this Cadillac, there's this Cadillac on the asset listing and living , and everyone was like, where, where is this Cadillac from? Where is it? Who has that, who bought that <laugh> ? It was , it was funny. It , it , it turns out it was something else, but for some reason it was written down there. But that's a perfect example. Somebody who didn't know anything about it wrote that, whereas, as opposed to the nation , um, writing it themselves. Right ? Yeah.
Speaker 2:Uh , I don't know if it was Ernie Daniels or someone from FNFA, the finance authority talking about how 10, 15 years ago projects Act dev projects were like 2 million, 5 million, $10 million. Now they're starting to lend money into the hundreds of millions of dollars. Does that make your job any more difficult when, when things are scaling up? Well,
Speaker 1:It makes it all that more important, I would say, because having a financial management system, having policies in place, having budgets, multi-year financial plans, a finance and audit committee, these are all pieces of that, of that system, they become more and more important the bigger the things are. Right? So we're just dealing with a hundred million, or I mean, sorry, a million dollar thing. Maybe people aren't quite as concerned about it. So it does , it does make it more important.
Speaker 2:Sure , yeah . Then you're looking at some of these massive pipeline deals and I mean, things really get blown up.
Speaker 1:Absolutely. Yeah .
Speaker 2:Yeah . Anything else about infrastructure that catches your eye or things you like to talk about? Well, it
Speaker 1:Aligns with what , uh, we do here. That, again, the capital asset piece is one piece of the financial management system, but , um, coming across Jason and the work that NEE is doing ended up being pretty aligned with nations who are like, we don't even take care of our asset listing. We don't even know what's going on. How are we going to plan for this big new build ? This one community I worked with built a whole arena without the help of Finney or FMB, and they, by the time they , uh, they had their , uh, grand opening this past year and they were just like, we wish you, we could've worked with you on all of this. So that it , it, it does , um, tie in really nicely because like I said, I sort of do the smaller asset listing, but as opposed to the big plans, the big infrastructure stuff and all the fine , all the pieces that go in in there, there Finnie just fits right in there in , in that piece. So
Speaker 2:How did Jason get you on that panel?
Speaker 1:Because we went out to , uh, Rosa River. All, all of the four institutions came out that day too , to present to them. So that's , um, that's how we got the group together today.
Speaker 2:I appreciate your time. Thanks so much. Thanks
Speaker 1:Mi We ,
Speaker 2:And see the show notes for links to the Financial Management Board, F-N-F-M-B as it's known, and of course, our infrastructure institute, where you will find all kinds of free tools and resources for your first nation. I'm Richard Perry. Thanks for listening.
