Metis Settlements Land Registry

Settlement Membership

As an authorized member of a Metis Settlement, a person is entitled to all the rights and benefits which are obtained by such membership. A person who wants to become a member of a Metis Settlement must apply to the Settlement council for membership approval. The council will examine each application for membership with the following criteria:

the applicant must be Metis, and must be 18 years old and,
the applicant must have previously been a member or a member of the Settlement association under the former Betterment Act, or must have lived in Alberta for the five years immediately preceding the date of application.
The criteria for membership in Metis Settlements is further addressed in Part 3 of the Metis Settlements Act.

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Registration Requirements

Some of the requirements for the recording or registration of land transactions are listed below. The requirements for the recording and registration of different land transactions will have different requirements. This list sets out and explains all the various types of requirements.

Administrator's Acknowledgment
An application to transfer a Metis title, allotment or provisional Metis title cannot be registered or recorded until the Settlement Administrator or his delegate has acknowledged that a copy of the form was given to the Settlement. The Administrator must sign the transfer form.

Appeal & Review
Many types of land transactions are subject to an appeal to the Metis Settlements Appeal Tribunal. The transfer of interests are subject to the review of the settlement council. These interest transactions may be registered if :

• The review period has expired without receiving a notice of objection to the transfer, or
• The administrator has confirmed that the transfer will not be reviewed.

Applicant
A person or corporation who applies to register a transaction must meet certain conditions. In all cases the person must be at least 18 years old. In some cases the person must be a member of the Settlement.

Attestations
All documents submitted for registration or recording must be signed by the applicant and holder. The signatures must be witnessed. If the signing of the document is witnessed by a person who is not a designated settlement official, the witness must complete a separate affidavit of execution, MSLR26. If a person signs with a mark an affidavit in support of a marksman, form MSLR27, must be submitted. If the applicant is a corporation, the document must be imprinted with the corporate seal or submitted with an affidavit of corporate signing authority.

Council Decision
Some transactions must be authorized by a decision of the settlement council. These transactions cannot be registered without some evidence of the council's decision.

Documents
Some transactions cannot be register without the submission of a document that binds the holder of an interest. For example, the granting of an allotment cannot be registered without the submission of a copy of the completed and signed memorandum of allotment document.

Dower
Some types of land interest will be subject to the provision of the Dower Act. Transactions dealing with these types of interest cannot be registered without the submission of the required dower forms.

Estate Instructions
Requests to transfer the interest of a deceased person are subject to any estate instructions filed with the Registrar. No transaction could be registered if it were contrary to those estate instructions.

Forms
All requests to record or register a land transaction must be made on a prescribed form. The forms are numbered using a "MSLR" prefix.

Holding Limits
A member is limited to the number and area of the parcels of land that may be held under a Metis title. There are also limits on the number of years that a person can hold a lease, allotment or provisional title.

Legibility
An interest cannot be registered if the documents submitted are illegible or are not capable of being duplicated or microfilmed.

Original Documents
All documents submitted for registration must be originals. A copy of an original document is not acceptable. A registrable interest can be recorded on the submission of a facsimile transmission of the original documents. The interest cannot be registered until the originals are submitted.

Parcel Description
An interest cannot be registered if the documents do not adequately identify the parcel or parcels of land affected by the interest.

Subdivision
No interest can be registered if it would have the effect of subdividing a parcel of land. A long term lease for part of a parcel of land would have the effect of subdividing the parcel and could not be registered until approved by the subdivision approving authority.

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Resource Development Agreement

A Resource Development Agreement (see also s.111(d) MSA) is an agreement respecting the developments of minerals between an operator and the General Council and a settlement council, entered into under the Co-management Agreement, or between an existing mineral lease holder and the General Council and the settlement council.

A mineral lease holder may acquire and record or register certain rights and interests in settlement lands. These rights and interests include:

• development agreements, under the Co-management Agreement
• right of entry orders granted by the Land Access Panel or Existing Leases Land Access Panel
• leases
• easements
• utility right of ways