Tahltan Heritage Trust Trustees Bill Adsit and Garry Merkel were delighted to present to the Tahltan membership at the Nation’s 2024 Tahltan Annual General Assembly in Dease Lake, on July 6th. Attending this important gathering each year enables the Trustees to connect with the membership to provide an update on Trust business and present the financials.
POSITIVE DEVELOPMENTS
Most notably, the Trustees had several positive developments to share this year:
- Reset relationship with Tahltan Leadership
- Updated the Trust Agreement with Tahltan government representatives
- Settled outstanding funds
- Distributed the balance of the accumulated surplus available for distribution to Tahltan Leadership for current priorities
- Audited Financial statements are now being provided
- Appointment of 3 new Trustees: Otis Hiltz, Kody Penner and Andrew Smit
2024 FINANCIALS
Bill began the presentation providing a summary of the 2023 financial statements, including the Income Statement and Balance Sheet. He detailed the sources of capital and income for the year, which totalled $64.4 million. In highlighting the portfolio value growth since 2018, which peaked at $59.6 million in 2023, the market value is actually higher (estimated at $80.5 million) because of additional equity value from the Trust’s 2017 investment in the Northwest Power Projects.
ANNUAL DISTRIBUTION
In presenting the annual distribution, Garry noted that 2024 marks the first year of a fixed annual distribution that will be set at $700,000 for the next three years. The Trustees introduced the fixed annual distribution last year to enable the delivery providers to confidently plan ahead year-to-year.
Annual Funds Available for Distribution (FAD) are still calculated using the calculation formula to monitor overall financial performance and to inform projections for the 3-year fixed distribution. The 2023 calculation yielded $425,605 FAD for 2023 but under the fixed annual distribution model, this would normally be bumped up to $700,00. However, in 2023, the total distribution was bumped even further to $3,288,886 to distribute all accumulated FAD that were not distributed in prior years plus meet additional requests by TCG.
This brings total distributions since 2018 to an impressive $4.19 million to TCG that are targeted for the Tahltan education fund. Education will continue as the default but may include additional priorities once the Tahltan Governments conduct member outreach to determine new priorities.
TRUST OVERVIEW
Bill provided a high-level overview of the Trust, including background and rationale on its creation. He outlined the requirements, qualification and duties of Trustees in managing the Trust, reiterating that Trustees are not responsible for program delivery from Trust income.
NEW TRUST OVERVIEW
With that as the foundation, Bill then introduced the new Tahltan Heritage Trust Agreement, which the Trustees had been developing with Tahltan government representatives over the past year. This has been a significant milestone in improving accountability of the Trust and Trustees as well as improving the relationship between the Trust and Tahltan governments.
Bill explained the rational for a new Trust Agreement and outlined the key changes, including:
- Corporate to a Trustee structure
- Revised Trust purpose
- Distribution mandate
- Consensus resolutions from all three Tahltan Governments
- Beneficiaries addition / removal requirements
Passed by resolution by the TCG Board, the new Trust Agreement will next be presented to the Iskut and Tahltan Governments to approve through resolution.
MEMBER RESOURCES
Members were reminded the Tahltan Heritage Trust website is a resource for news, information, presentations and financials. They were encouraged to join the Trust’s email list to stay informed of news and developments.
MEMBER DISCUSSION
A question and answer session followed the presentation. The discussion focussed on how use of distributions could shift from solely education to initiatives that benefit more members directly, as well as calls for new Trustees.
PRESENTATION MATERIALS
For a detailed recap of the presentation and question and answer session, review the presentation and read the minutes. Questions can be directed to info@tahltanheritagetrust.com.