Northern News Services

Yellowknife (Feb 18/02) - The women's shelter in Cambridge Bay will shut down this week without a miracle from the territorial government.

"There is a crisis with the crisis shelter," said Maureen McDowell, director of community wellness for this Kitikmeot community.

The shelter is open on the mercy of council, which is scrambling to find funding to cover the shelter's projected $32,000 budget overrun by the end of this fiscal year on March 31.

McDowell said the shelter -- a three bedroom house that sits at a secret location on the edge of the community -- is in a much more expensive replay of last year's $25,000 over-budget troubles.

The Department of Health and Social Services bailed them out then.

"I have a feeling we may not be able to this time," said McDowell.

The shelter is operating $15,000 over budget on a one-week council extension.

Council cannot absorb any more of the shelter's money problems and might be forced to shut it down this week if the Department of Health and Social Services doesn't pull through, said Mayor Keith Peterson.

Hamlets cannot operate with a deficit for more than one year under Nunavut legislation, which forces the council's hand.

The shelter opened in 1994 and receives a set hamlet-administered grant of $75,000 from the government each year.

"We haven't received a raise in money since we opened," said McDowell.

Costs have risen even if the grants haven't for the shelter, which helped 129 women and children since April 1, 2001.

The shelter housed 63 women and 66 children fleeing drunken abuse in their homes.

The shelter has one full-time co-ordinator and five part-time staff.

Department representatives in Cambridge Bay could not be reached for comment as of press time.

Peterson was scheduled to meet with the hamlet's fiance committee today to decide the next step.

He said the shelter's problems are part of the government's habitual under-funding of services.

"(The government) is off-loading services to hamlets but not providing adequate funding," said Peterson, who expects the government to step in. "They can't be that cold and heartless," he said.

And if it doesn't, where will the women go when the shelter shuts down?

McDowell didn't have an answer. "I guess we'll have to get creative," she said.