Stephanie McDonald
Northern News Services
Monday, July 9, 2007

IQALUIT - The $56 million in funding for family violence prevention programs and services announced by the federal government on June 22 has been earmarked for Indian Act reserves only, leaving those who run women’s shelters in Nunavut scrambling for other funding.

The money will fund 35 existing women’s shelters in First Nations communities and go towards building five new ones.

"It’s difficult to see how Aboriginal women living here in the North will realize any benefit from this new funding allotment," said Rian van Bruggen, senior program specialist, Women’s Initiatives. "Nunavut is dealing with some of the highest statistics of violence against women and family violence in the whole of Canada. It’s obvious that we’d be in the greatest need of assistance from the federal government."

The news was especially disappointing for the hamlet of Kugluktuk, which has been searching for ongoing funding for a desperately needed crisis shelter, something the community has gone without for three years.

SAO Linda Allen estimated that Kugluktuk needs $350,000 annually to operate a shelter. The Government of Nunavut’s Department of Health and Social Services has provided just $70,000 a year in the past. That money is simply not enough to operate a 24-hour a day shelter, pay staff wages, and meet safety regulations, Allen said.

"Our suicide rate in Kugluktuk is very high, our crime rate is very high, and we’re very concerned about turning that around," Allen said. "In order to do so, we need to help people when they need help."

The local Health and Social Services office receives approximately 12 calls a week, 90 per cent of which can’t be dealt with due to lack of resources. Allen said that because people know there are no services available to turn to, there is a correlation between the lack of services and the suicide and crime rates.

In Rankin Inlet, the situation is less dire. The Kataujaq Society Safe Shelter serves the Kivilliq region and opens when there are clients.

"We do get substantial funding from Health and Social Services. We’re doing ok," said executive director of the shelter, Evelyn Thordarson.

Funding for the shelter was increased in the past couple of years as the organization found they were always running out of money, Thordarson said.

Despite its current financial situation, the Kataujaq shelter has had to scale back the length of time a women is able to stay. Whereas in the past women from out of town could remain for up to four weeks, this has been reduced to two to three weeks. Clients from within Rankin are only eligible to stay a week, rather than the two that was previously available to them.

Thordarson would like to see more money in the operating budget for training, wages, and renovations to the shelter.

Thordarson recognizes that the Rankin shelter is lucky compared to the situation faced by other shelters and hamlets. "Every community should be able to have a shelter," she said.

There are women’s crisis shelters in Iqaluit, Rankin Inlet, Taloyoak, and Cambridge Bay. Shelter use in Nunavut in a single day is 10 times higher than the national average, when calculated as a rate per 100,000 people, according to the "Measuring Violence Against Women: Statistical Trends 2006" report.