Batchewana First Nation company receives $442K to expand operations

Trucor Steel Structures Inc. has received $442,000 in funding through FedNor in order to expand into the development of housing and construction projects through the acquisition of heavy equipment. 

Sault Ste. Marie MP Terry Sheehan joined First Nations leadership and FedNor employees to announce the federal funding at the company’s Gran Street headquarters in Rankin Monday.

“What we have right now before us is an Indigenous-owned, Indigenous-led business that’s providing excellent opportunities for regional economic growth, and for job creation,” Sheehan said during the announcement. “But they also foster community empowerment and self determination — many small and single-industry dependent communities have limited service infrastructure to attract new business investments, so investments that address those limitations can provide economic opportunities for generations to come, and you’re the vehicle in which we do that, by building that infrastructure.”

The funding received by Trucor will enable it to purchase a front-end loader, skid steer and a pair of excavators — a move that’s expected to create 10 full-time construction jobs in the future.   

Trucor Steel Structures Inc. President and Chief Executive Officer Ken Daigle says the funding will ultimately enable the company to get into the development game by giving it the tools it needs to dig foundations for housing projects and other structures. 

“This has allowed us to do more, and it will create jobs,” Daigle told reporters following the announcement. “I think the best part about it is, this is what reconciliation is all about. This is about allowing us to not to be stagnant, to help move the economy.”

A new excavator acquired by Trucor last week through the FedNor funding has also allowed the company to start work on digging the foundation for a building that will eventually house a provincial territorial organization in Rankin. 

“The machine is going to be critical. Now that it’s here, the machine will make this project not only go faster, but it makes it work — it allows us to have guys that would normally be laid off,” Daigle said. 

The Indigenous-led business partnered with an engineering firm in order to form a new company, Turtle Island Group, that is dedicated to creating new developments in the future.   

“We put our head down, we just worked. And that’s how we survived,” said Daigle. “We were crawling, and now we’re starting to walk — and soon, we’ll be running.”