Glen Korstrom
Northern News Services

NNSL (Aug 04/99) - Even though a new Yellowknife Correctional Centre and male young offenders' facility will add $30 million to the Yellowknife economy, Yellowknife North MLA, Roy Erasmus, favours more public consultation on the issue.

His two main reasons are that, as far as he is concerned, the proper process was not followed and young offenders will share some facilities used by adults.

"Although my constituency includes the part of the city of Yellowknife and this project is one that is in Yellowknife...there is no way that I can rationalize such a major shift as putting youth offenders together with adults in the same building," Erasmus told a committee of the whole last week in the legislature.

Minister of Justice, Stephen Kakfwi, countered that Erasmus' statement was not factual -- that young offenders would never be in the line of vision of adult offenders.

"There is no intent to put the young offenders and the adult offenders in the same building," Kakfwi said.

"The intent is to have them share some of the facilities."

That current YCC site, where the new structure is set to be built, is rimmed with a barbed-wire fence.

As such, it is very different from previous young offender facilities in the NWT in appearance.

And Hay River MLA, Jane Groenewegen, hinted that it could be psychologically damaging for the youths to be housed in a place resembling a prison.

In addition to the safety of the young offenders, Erasmus is concerned that the proper process wasn't followed that resulted in cabinet's decision to build the new facility.

He says this concern stems from the fact that the proposal for a new facility evolved from the one calling for simple renovations, without MLAs from surrounding ridings being consulted quickly enough.

Premier Jim Antoine apologized for the delay in forwarding information on the change.

The financial management board made the decision to change the project from a renovation to a new facility on June 4. Information was not passed onto a committee of MLAs until July 14.

The financial plan now is for the project to cost about $30 million spread across four years.

Yellowknife architects Ferguson Simek and Clark prompted the FMB decision on the project by estimating $1.34 million could be saved in capital costs and $262,000 in ongoing operations and maintenance.

A motion for cabinet to reconsider its decision was voted down last week when Yellowknife MLAs Jake Ootes and Seamus Henry sided with the government.