20 METIS NA TION Of ONT ARIO Annu A l Repo R t 20122013 m e TI s re GI s T ra TI on and I den TI f IC a TI on M etis living in Ontario can make an application for citizenship to the Metis Nation of Ontario MNO which maintains in Ottawa the only pr ovincial r egistr y for Metis r ecognized by the gover nments of Ontario and Canada An independent r egistrar assesses applications and authorizes citizenship when applicants meet the criteria set out in the national defnition for Metis adopted at the Metis National Council s 18th General Assembly in 2002 and subsequently accepted by the MNO Once accepted MNO citizens become part of a centralized r egistr y which has valid genealogical documen tation on fle Thr ough the administration of its own r egistr y the MNO exer cises the Metis Nation s fundamental right of selfdetermination by establishing its own citizenship based on the inter national principles of self identifcation and community acceptance In or der to pr ovide clarity on the national defnition and ensur e the MNO Registr y was applying the new defnition consistently an Interim Registr y Policy was developed and appr oved by the Pr ovisional Council of the Metis Nation of Ontario PCMNO in May 2009 The Interim Registr y Policy did not change the national defni tion in any way It simply pr ovided clarity to the principles on how the national defnition of Metis should be applied based on the principles set out in the Statement of Prime Purpose the MNO bylaws the MNO Har vesters policy and other MNO gover nance documents In 2009 the MNO lacked the funding necessar y to conduct pr ovidewide consultations on the Interim Registr y Policy that would have explained its purposes and sought input fr om MNO citizens In the r esulting vacuum misinformation ar ose about the policy leading to misunderstandings about its purpose and value T o pr ovide citizens with the corr ect information and to develop a permanent Metis Identifcation and Registr y Policy citizens at the 2010 MNO Annual General Assembly AGA passed a r esolution establishing the pr ocess for developing a permanent Metis Identifcation and Registr y Policy The twoyear pr ocess included two r ounds of community consultations The frst r ound took place between October 2010 and Mar ch 2011 The MNO leadership travelled to 29 dif fer ent communities acr oss Ontario and met with over 3000 citizens to hear their views on ever y issue surr ounding the MNO Identifcation and the Registr y Policy Their views wer e com piled into a What W e Hear d r eport that was r eleased and discussed at the 2011 AGA The What W e Hear d r eport was posted on the MNO website and was used as the basis for discussion at a second r ound of community consultations that took place in the frst thr ee months of 2012 In this r ound the d EM o G r APHI c S the per manent Metis Identifcation and Registry Policy will support a rigor ous application pr ocess which must be undertaken by individual applicants because it establishes the cr edibility and integrity of the MNO s citizenship application pr ocess