by Jeff Colbourne
Northern News Services

BAKER LAKE (Aug 27/97) - Baker Lake wants what is coming to it.

The hamlet council decided August 15 at a special meeting to write a letter to territorial Health and Social Services Minister Kelvin Ng and other government officials asking for the transfer of the Department of Health and Social Services by Nov. 1, 1997.

Footprints 2 recommends the department be transferred from Rankin Inlet to Baker Lake with the onset of Nunavut. Its directives state that in a decentralized government the community should get 45 new positions.

Thirty-six of these positions should come from the department of Health and Social Services with the remaining positions coming from the Department of Education, Culture and Employment.

"This is something that's been in the plans and it's documented very clearly in Footprints 2," said Mayor William Noah. "It's natural to think that this should take place," he added.

Not only does Baker Lake want the Department of Health and Social Services because it was promised it. The community also wants it because leaders are not happy with the way things are being run by the department and the Keewatin Regional Health Board.

Their dismay began when the regional social services office was removed from Baker Lake around 10 months ago. The community felt it was robbed of a number of social services jobs -- jobs that were relocated to Rankin Inlet when the Department of Social Services amalgamated with the Department of Health.

In a letter to Ng, dated May 13 (following the removal of the community's dental therapist), Baker Lake told him that the therapist's removal was the "final atrocity the KRHB shall inflict on the people of Baker Lake."

"Local needs have not been addressed adequately by the existing KRHB," the letter said.

The hamlet has since taken legal action against the department to separate from the KRHB to form their own Health Society.

Baker Lake is a community plagued by unemployment with 71.3 per cent of the Inuit population without work.

Kivalliq MLA Kevin O'Brien said it's going to be a tough priority for the hamlet and him push for the transfer of Health and Social Services by Nov. 1.

"The hamlet is not asking for something that hasn't been promised," said O'Brien, who was in Baker Lake last week talking with council.

O'Brien said on a number of occasions he's brought this issue and other related issues up to Ng in the legislature, but Ng has failed to give him solid answers.

"I support the motion 100 percent. The time is at hand. They have to start getting this government set up," O'Brien said.

The resolution, which was passed while KRHB's CEO Jim Egan and chair Betty Palfrey were present in Baker Lake's council chambers Aug 15, stated that to date, Baker Lake has not received any information about the pending transfer.

Kelvin Ng was not available for comment last week. His executive secretary, Kat Nicholson, said as of last Friday they have not received the letter outlining the resolution from the Hamlet of Baker Lake.