Derek Neary
Northern News Services

Fort Simpson (June 28/02) - The staff level among Deh Cho resource management officers could get worse before it gets better.

The Department of Indian Affairs and Northern Development (DIAND) district office has been operating with a single resource management officer for the past four months, and he is planning to move by August.

Ed Hornby, South Mackenzie district manager, said a competition was already held to identify a second officer, but he said there weren't enough qualified candidates. Consequently, another competition will have to take place on a wider basis, he said.

It will likely be the end of summer before someone moves into the job, according to Hornby, who added there will be an attempt to keep at least two resource management officers in the office.

"We're certainly going to make an effort to have inspections properly done," he said.

"It can be pretty busy (in Fort Simpson). One person is not going to what two people did."

Liidlii Kue First Nation (LKFN) Chief Rita Cli said she continues to have misgivings over the staffing level.

She said the LKFN and DIAND Minister Robert Nault have exchanged letters on the matter over the past year.

"There's so much rumbling and rumours about this (Mackenzie Valley) pipeline ... and there's a shortage of staff," said Cli.

"I have raised the concern that the office is not geared up for (environmental) impact if it happens."

Kent Halvorson, a resource management officer with the Fort Simpson district office for several years in the 1990s, said asking one person to oversee the region is asking too much.

"That's not right. They've got to spend a little more time looking after Fort Simpson. There's enough going on there to keep, probably, two RMOs (resource management officers) and a water officer busy," said Halvorson, who now works for a private environmental consulting firm in the Calgary area.

He added that the DIAND district office used to have a total of five positions, and that was before oil and gas work commenced in Fort Liard. "And we still stayed busy enough then," Halvorson said.

Hornby said DIAND has determined that workload factors in the Fort Simpson office have varied dramatically.

Whether a third position will be awarded in the future is still undecided, he said.