Kákeltn Siyám

I have had the pleasure of speaking with Gibby Jacob on a number of occasions. He is the kind of man who makes you feel, within minutes of conversation, that you are talking to someone who has genuinely thought about the world — not just his corner of it, but all of it. He talks about family. He talks about seaweed. He talks about business. And somehow, in the space of a single conversation, all three feel like the same subject.

Chief Gilbert "Gibby" Jacob — whose ancestral name is Kákeltn Siyám (pronounced Kokel-ten See-yam) — is a Hereditary Chief of the Squamish Nation, located in North Vancouver, British Columbia. He spent 37 years in service to his people: 32 as an elected Councillor, 37 concurrently as a staff member of the Nation. That is not a typo. The overlap is the point. Gibby has never done just one thing at a time.

He is now retired from elected office. But "retired" is a word that does not quite fit the man. He is, if anything, more active than ever — producing documentary films, advising on agricultural innovation, and planting what he calls "seeds of hope and charity" wherever he goes. Just Gerald is proud to name him our Indigenous Leader of the Year.

The Man Who Helped Bring the Olympics Home

In 2003, when Vancouver was bidding to host the 2010 Winter Olympics, the final presentation to the International Olympic Committee in Prague came down to ten people. Gibby Jacob was one of them. He represented both the Squamish Nation and the Lil'wat Nation — the two First Nations whose traditional territory would host the Games — and his presence in that room was not ceremonial. It was essential.

When Vancouver won the bid, Gibby was appointed as the VANOC board member representing both Nations for the full duration of planning and execution of the 2010 Olympic and Paralympic Games. He also helped broker the deal that established the Squamish Lil'wat Cultural Centre in Whistler, and secured the Olympic Land Legacy — several tracts of land in the Whistler community, including the Baxter Creek area above the Rainbow subdivision, now being developed for housing.

That is the kind of work that does not make headlines the way a gold medal does. But it lasts longer.

Sen̓áḵw: A City Within a City

The project that will define Gibby's legacy — and the Squamish Nation's economic future — is Sen̓áḵw (pronounced Sen-awk), a 6,000-unit rental housing development on Squamish reserve land in the Kitsilano neighbourhood of Vancouver. When all four phases are complete, projected for 2033, the development will make the Squamish Nation worth an estimated $5 billion from business revenue, royalties, and real estate assets.

It is the largest Indigenous-led housing and retail development in Canadian history. Eleven towers rising from land that was once taken, then returned. The Squamish Nation voted 87% in favour of the project in 2019. Gibby was instrumental in making it happen — not just as a negotiator, but as a visionary who understood that economic sovereignty and cultural sovereignty are the same thing.

"Our people have been here for thousands of years," he has said. "We're not going anywhere." Sen̓áḵw is the architectural proof of that statement.

Seaweed, Kelp, and the Long Memory of Howe Sound

When Gibby talks about seaweed, he is not talking about a niche interest. He is talking about a food system that sustained his people for millennia. The Squamish people have harvested seaweed, herring roe, kelp, and shellfish from Burrard Inlet and Howe Sound — known in Squamish as Átl'ḵa7tsem — since long before the first European ship appeared on the horizon.

In 2012, Gibby signed a historic declaration with the Tsleil-Waututh Nation to protect the Salish Sea. He served as Executive Operating Officer for the Squamish Nation's participation in the Howe Sound Ocean Watch. And he has volunteered on the advisory board of Affinor Growers, a vertical farming technology company — because he sees in modern growing technology the same principle that guided traditional harvesting: take care of the land, and the land takes care of you.

Kelp forest restoration work in Átl'ḵa7tsem / Howe Sound — a project close to Gibby's heart

Back to the Fire: Keeping the Knowledge Alive

In 2023, Gibby founded Treasure Box Entertainment with filmmaker Andy Keen. Their first project is Back to the Fire — a 6-part documentary series in which Gibby travels across British Columbia to record the wisdom of Indigenous elders and leaders. The premise is simple and urgent: these teachings exist in living memory, and that window is closing.

"In search of lost values that could change the world" is how the series describes itself. Gibby describes it more personally: he bore witness to the generational disruptions caused by the residential school system, the profound loss of an ancient lineage. Back to the Fire is his answer to that loss — not a lament, but a transmission.

The collaboration between Gibby and Keen — an Indigenous hereditary chief and a non-Indigenous filmmaker — has been described as "an act of reconciliation on a small scale." That is exactly the kind of reconciliation that actually works: two people, one project, a shared belief that the knowledge is worth saving.