By Ann-Maureen Owens
with photography by Bernard Clark
Two years ago, while she was both a full-time law student at Queen’s University and the executive director of Kingston Native Centre and Languages Nest (KNCLN), Constance Carrière-Prill had the idea of establishing Indigenous-led legal services. As someone studying the law and running an organization that does front-line community work, she had seen a disconnect between the needs of some Indigenous people for legal services and what they felt they could access.
Constance discussed this concept of creating a legal services hub to take into account Indigenous views, legal traditions, and unique needs with one of her professors, Lindsay Borrows, who teaches special topics in the field of Indigenous law. Lindsay was supportive of the idea of establishing legal services, educational supports, and advocacy for the local Indigenous community. Both women agreed to work together on this vision and reach out to others to form a working group, inviting Indigenous law academics and practitioners to join them. They applied for funding to do the preliminary work from The Law Foundation of Ontario, which is a body eager to support Indigenous-led projects. Queen’s Law Clinics would be an important partner in this project, but the centre of operation would rest with KNCLN.
Born in Sturgeon Falls, a town of under 7,000 that is now part of the municipality of West Nipissing in northern Ontario, Constance grew up the second oldest . . .
