FACT FILE Cash for constitutional closure	($)
Administration	528,000
Travel and meetings	773,000
Communications	385,000
Aboriginal Summit	405,000
Constitutional Conference	400,000
Total	2,491,000
Source: proposed CWG budget

by Richard Gleeson
Northern News Services

NNSL (Sep 24/97) - The group working on a constitution for the Western Arctic revealed at a public meeting last week that it is asking the federal and territorial governments for a $2.5-million budget.

Its goal is to produce a draft constitution to be voted on by the public in 17 months time. And while the goal of reaching consensus on a constitution has been around for some 15 years, a new approach is being used.

Changes in the Constitutional Working Group's approach include the establishment of an office, headed up by executive director Steve Iveson, a veteran of the GNWT's department of aboriginal affairs.

Day-to-day operations will be overseen by full-time office manger Jeanne Gagnon. The group is seeking a full-time communications director.

The staff will be complemented by contracted political heavyweights George Braden and Bernie Funston.

Braden is a former government leader and was a member of the Bourque Commission, which wrote its report on constitutional development in 1992. Funston was director of constitutional law for the GNWT, and is working out of Ottawa.

The additional support will be secured only if the federal government agrees to the $2.5-million budget the group is seeking for the next 18 months.

Broken down annually, that's an almost 400 per cent increase from the group's 1996-97 budget. The group is asking the feds to foot 66 per cent of the bill.

Co-chairs Jim Antoine and George Kurszewski and two more members will get a good indication of how forthcoming that federal support will be early next month, when they meet with DIAND minister Jane Stewart.

Prior to that, Stewart will be briefed by Kirk Cameron, a DIAND bureaucrat and self-described "working observer" with the group.

"All I can say is this has been a most useful two days and it will be most useful to me when I go back to make an argument for continuing the process," said Cameron, referring to the meeting. Apart from courting federal dollars, and the daunting task of finding a form of government acceptable to the diverse interests in the North, the group still has to deal with the sticky issue of the plebiscite, which also arose Friday.

"I don't think we should get ahead of ourselves and say the legislative office here will be in charge (of the plebiscite)," said Bill Erasmus, chief of the Dene Nation and a member of the working group.

Last year Erasmus said those thinking the plebiscite would be run on the basis of one-man one-vote were "dreaming in technicolor."