Rankin Inlet's current money troubles are an embarrassment. Incompetent record keeping has allowed the budget to go into a $2.2 million deficit.

But the hamlet should not face the music alone. The Government of Nunavut shares the responsibility.

According to Shawn Maley, superintendent of the department of Community Government and Transportation for Kivalliq, the problem began two years ago when the financial officer's position remained vacant for five months.

The hamlet gets 80 per cent of its budget from the territorial government, who should have ensured there was someone watching the bottom line in Rankin. It is their money and they are responsible for monitoring the hamlet.

A press release issued by the hamlet on Aug. 11 stated that mismanagement of the budget was well documented by the Department of Community Government and Transportation.

Why didn't the department do something? Couldn't the GN have worked with the hamlet and sorted things out instead of watching while the situation got worse and worse?

So the hamlet's woes are as much a consequence of the GN's lack of action as their own disorganization.

According to financial comptroller Greg Morash, the hamlet's record keeping was a mess, invoices were not being sent and public works services were falling apart.

Now the hamlet has to eliminate 10 casual jobs which means Rankin Inlet has 10 fewer options for employment due to incompetence.

Hopefully this a hard lesson learned for the hamlet.

Morash said a balanced budget is possible in two years. Until then, it will be a long road of cutbacks and tightening belts.

Let's hope other communities learn from this embarrassment and the GN keeps better track of its dollars.

Despite the fact that this summer's successful bowhead whale hunt made headlines across the territory, many say that soon whale hunts won't be newsworthy at all.

The first hunt, in Repulse Bay in 1996, was both a hunting and public relations disaster.

Not to mention that final price tags shocked the public and regulatory bodies -- making it news.

The 1998 Cumberland Sound bowhead whale hunt was newsworthy because it proved that an efficient and economical hunt could be pulled off.

Now people are saying that reporting on smooth and frequent whale hunts will be like reporting every time a caribou or seal is shot.

The hunters, however, see it differently when they proudly tow in their catch of the day.

Shouldn't we continue to recognize whale hunts and how they bring a territory together?

Mike Gardener wants to see someone in Iqaluit form an advocacy group to monitor the price of groceries sold by the community's three different stores.

With more than 40 years of shopping in Nunavut under his belt, he said he questioned whether or not the stores passed on their savings to their customers.

One basis for his belief, he said, was that all three stores have been known to sell the same item at a different price on the same day.

Gardener also said he was tired of the explanation that prices were as high as they were because that was the cost of doing business in the North.

But Gardener doesn't need a watchdog group, he already knows how to shop effectively and the rest of us can learn from his example.

Competition between stores is a shopper's best friend and the more we patronize the one offering lower prices, the more they will be encouraged to do more to keep the cost of living down.