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Hot monopoly Weekend Yellowknifer - Friday, June 24, 2011
With crude oil prices nearing $100 US per barrel again this summer, and only expected to go higher in the coming years, it seems likely that cheap petroleum is a thing of the past. Fuel prices have a huge impact on a city like Yellowknife - the coldest city in Canada, according to Environment Canada, with an average temperature of -5.4 C. When Yellowknife residents rejected the city's bid to borrow up to $49 million to build a district energy system using a mixture of wood pellets and geothermal energy from Con Mine in a referendum last March, it wasn't because people disliked the idea of district energy. It was because they feared what would happen if the city bankrolled a $60.4 million project largely on the backs of city ratepayers, who would have to absorb the cost if district energy failed. Last week, the city signed a memorandum of understanding with the B.C.-based utility company Corix, whereby the 2,000 employee-plus firm will finance the construction of a district energy system to heat 39 downtown buildings. The project will surely gain much broader support if this takes ratepayers off the hook. A big complaint before the referendum from homeowners in Range Lake, Frame Lake South and other neighbourhoods was that there didn't seem to be any benefits for them, but rather only to Yellowknife's largest landlords. The city insisted the project would eventually expand outside downtown but that's years away. With a potential private partner in place willing to take on the costs of building the system, the plan is much more palatable. What isn't clear is who is going to be the watchdog once Corix gains a monopoly on heat distribution to these downtown buildings. Corix's vice-president Jack Touhey admits utility prices are typically higher when a private company is investing in it, although the company suggest customers could pay off the construction of the district energy system over a stretch of 50 years, making it easier to manage payments. Mayor Gord Van Tighem indicates the city itself will be the regulator, although he didn't rule out involving the NWT Public Utilities Board, which already regulates rates charged by Northland Utilities and NWT Power Corporation. It would seem less cumbersome to the city if it stuck to fixing roads and replacing sewers, rather than taking on responsibilities for regulating district energy rates -- especially with a utility regulator in this city that already has expertise in examining rate applications and setting rates. Corix still hasn't decided whether it will actually proceed. In the meantime, city council should figure out what the implications are for the city with a private monopoly providing heat downtown. How will businesses and apartment dwellers be best protected from exorbitant rates? What's going to happen when current heating fuel suppliers lose their downtown customers? There are many questions to be asked over the next few months.
A great opportunity Editorial Comment Roxanna Thompson Deh Cho Drum - Thursday, June 23, 2011
There was no reason for the people who witnessed the signing not to be happy. Through the agreement, Canadian Zinc has promised to maximize the employment of Liidlii Kue First Nation (LKFN) members at the Prairie Creek Mine and to give preference to LKFN businesses that supply goods and services. When the mine opens, presuming it will, Fort Simpson residents can look forward to an array of new employment possibilities. The mine is expected to create 220 full-time jobs in total. Being located only a few hundred kilometres from the mine and having an agreement with the company behind the venture is almost a dream come true. As Nahendeh MLA Kevin Menicoche pointed out during his speech at the signing ceremony, Deh Cho communities have been continually struggling with a lack of employment and economic opportunities. This agreement is a step towards addressing those problems. Menicoche, however, also had an equally valid point that brought a dose of reality back into the moment. LKFN has an agreement with Canadian Zinc but it is just words on signed pieces of paper. It will be up to Liidlii Kue First Nation members and other community residents to make the agreement into something that's worthwhile. Getting the agreement might prove to be the easiest part of the path. The Deh Cho doesn't have a history of underground mining, so few residents, except the ones who've taken training for the diamond mines, have the skill sets required for that kind of employment. There are, of course, many other types of jobs at the mine but most of them also require specialized training whether it be in management or kitchen procedures. Most of the people looking to the mine for the promise of employment will need additional training to ensure they can take advantage of the preferred hiring status they now have, due to the agreement. Luckily the agreement has accounted for that with Canadian Zinc making contributions to an education fund that will assist LKFN members who are seeking vocational or technical skills training or education. Canadian Zinc also said it plans to work with the territorial government to put training and education programs in place related to the mine. All of these provisions will make it easier for LKFN members to qualify for positions but it will still require people to take action to grasp these opportunities. Following the signing ceremony, Chief Jim Antoine of Liidlii Kue First Nation said the band could only dream of an agreement like this one years ago. Band members owe it to themselves as well as their community and the region to ensure that every opportunity is squeezed out of the now accessible dream. Let's stop the rumours Editorial Comment Samantha Stokell Inuvik Drum - Thursday, June 23, 2011
A journalist's job is to research and investigate any number of tidbits that come their way each and every day. Instead of spreading gossip or rumours, reporters collect these tantalizing 'news tips' and try to verify them. Usually they are bits of truth that need a bit more information to flesh out into an interesting story. Sometimes, however, these rumours turn out to be completely false and sometimes it is the newspaper, radio or television reporter's job to put a stop to rumours. This week Inuvik was filled with fear and suspicions about the death of a tourist at the hands of some locals. The rumours peaked on June 15 and spread wildly out of control reaching the ears of NWT Tourism in Yellowknife, the mayor's office here in town and even residents of other NWT communities, such as Deline. The rumour that was heard by this reporter, and by multiple people, was that a young man from out of town was walking with a case of beer to the Happy Valley Campground. Two Inuvik residents wanted to have some of his beer and when he refused to give it to him, they beat him up and took his beer. He was then medevaced to Edmonton, where he later died. That is the story that circulated around town, growing in size and severity. If that rumour were true, it would have enormous implications for Inuvik. The poor man's family would likely hate this town, as would all other tourists. So long, tourism industry! Who wants to travel to the end of the road and fear they might be beaten to death? If stabbings in Mexico can affect their tourism industry, it's likely a beating death would not be good news for Inuvik. As it turns out, this story got blown out of proportion. It was a consensual fight between consensual adults, who were drinking together. And the tourist is alive. In Yellowknife. Not dead in Edmonton. The RCMP, it turns out, also got a fair bit of attention for this incident. It turns out they were inundated with calls trying to confirm or deny the event. Instead of addressing the issue, they said no comment. Why would they want to fan the flames of this rumour? Ignoring it for them, seemed like the best option. That is an opinion to respect, except that it doesn't really make sense. The quickest way to dissipate the rumours would be to clarify the story with the local media. Get the word out as quickly as possible. There is no public safety concern. No one has died. No one got jumped on the streets. When the rumours get to a certain point, one has to stamp them out as quickly as possible. And that is where the media can help. This isn't just for the RCMP, but politicians and other leaders, too. As much as you like to use the media for positive stories, we can also help when things go wrong or even when things appear to go wrong. Use the media to get the truth out. That's what it's there for.
A strong fight for a good cause Yellowknifer - Wednesday, June 22, 2011
More than $213,000, a record amount for our city, was raised for the Canadian Cancer Society through the Relay for Life last week.
The 12-hour overnight event is more than a fundraiser, but an opportunity to raise awareness about cancer, the leading cause of death in Canada.
Those who participate gather to cherish the memories of loved ones lost to cancer and continue to build financial aid to find a cure, in addition to walking or running around a track.
In 2004, Yellowknife held its first Relay for Life cancer fundraiser, raking in close to $60,000 by 21 teams. Seven years later, almost double the number of teams participated, 43 teams with 463 participants.
The relay came shortly after Stanton Territorial Hospital Foundation's Protecting the Jewels of the North fundraiser, which raised money for prostate and testicular cancer services and programs at the hospital.
According to the Canadian Cancer Society, it's estimated that between 10,000 and 15,000 deaths could be prevented if 80 per cent of Canadians aged 50-74 were screened over the next decade.
With more than 40 survivors taking part in this year's relay, came stories of diagnosis, hospital gowns, conversations with doctors, hugs from family and tears of confusion, pain and after some excruciating journeys, tears of success and triumph in conquering cancer. Their stories are powerful.
We just want to hear fewer such accounts as this dreaded disease is overcome.
Yellowknife's skateboard park is better off elsewhere.
The rolling of wheels on concrete, metal grinding on rails, the pop of the deck's tail when it strikes the ground to lift the board into the air - this is the inherent ambiance of the sport. Unfortunately, these sounds are echoing into the homes of families living around St. Joseph School, where the skateboard park currently exists. At times, there's also the voices of the skaters, sometimes unnecessarily loud, sometimes using foul language late into the evening.
In an effort to reduce the noise, the city has surrounded the park with trees and a fence, but this shroud leads to other problems. Serious skateboarders go there to practice, but it's also been, throughout the years, a hangout for kids to go and drink or smoke marijuana, and a place where a rougher crowd has gone and started fights; unfortunately this is what can happen when an unsupervised area frequented by youth is shielded from the public eye.
City council is discussing several options for a new location, but the best choice is a lot near the Fieldhouse. It's far enough away from any residential area that noise will be less of a concern, and a relatively constant flow of traffic down Kam Lake Road will deter the park from being used by partiers, which would make it a more inviting and a safer place for skateboarders of all ages.
While the skate park is important to maintain for well-intentioned youth looking for a healthy pastime, the $500,000 minimum price tag attached to the project by the department of community services should be thoroughly vetted. The park ought to be moved when the city can afford it, so it won't accelerate the city's constantly increasing property taxes.
Skateboarding is a popular sport in the city. If our municipal politicians get the opportunity to invest in sporting facilities, this relocation should be a top priority.
The Kivalliq was awash this past week with the e-mail activity that always follows the battle for Lord Stanley's mug.
It was the usual hodgepodge of material, with some being downright stupid, some nonsensical and some just plain weird.
But the vast majority sent out over cyberspace were in good taste and really quite funny, including one from a dedicated Bruins fan declaring himself sovereign over the secessional state of Boston 2.0.
Irritating, however, were those trying to belittle people who cheered for the Bruins over a Canadian team.
Now let's get serious here for a moment, shall we?
To do that, we'll even forget the fact every Kivalliq fan reading this who cheers for the Toronto Maple Leafs would never root for the Montreal Canadiens, supposing they were the last Canadian team on the planet, let alone in one series against an American-based team.
The majority of players on every NHL team are still Canadians, and there was no shortage of good Canadian boys in Bruins jerseys hoisting Lord Stanley this past week.
I was pretty much ambivalent when the final series began.
I had no real affinity for either club and was just hoping the games would make up for what I found to be a playoff year devoid of much intensity.
This year's playoffs seemed to feature more soccer guys than hockey players, the way they were dropping to the ice as if shot every time an opponent touched them.
As the final wore on, I found myself cheering more and more for Boston.
The feeling reached its peak near the end of game six when Brad Marchand gave Daniel Sedin a series of love taps to the lips which garnered no response from Sedin or any other Canucks player.
By this point, the Bruins had put fear into the hearts of the Vancouver stars and it was no surprise when Daniel and his twin, Henrik, were both on the ice for every Boston goal in the final game.
There is a very vocal segment of the population who shake their heads at the Bruins' intimidation of the Vancouver stars on their way to victory.
If given their way, they would remove physicality from the game forever.
It makes me laugh when these same "fans" point to Wayne Gretzky's time with the Edmonton Oilers as a shining example of how the game should be played, based on the number of goals they scored.
Could you imagine the aftermath of a rival player punching The Great One in the mouth several times back then?
Thankfully, NHL owners need their teams to be successful to make money.
So as long as teams keep winning Cups with a physical brand of play, the march towards removing physical play from the game entirely will remain fairly slow.
One of the NHL's all-time builders, Conn Smythe, once said, "If you can't lick 'em in the alley, you can't beat 'em on the ice."
While those days may be gone forever in their purest sense, the waning hearts of the Canucks stars showed there's still a place for toughness at the game's highest level.
Toughness, skill and determination have long been the mantra of Canadian hockey.
And the Bruins' Stanley Cup win may have preserved that Canadian style in the NHL for, at least, a few more years to come.
Graduating 10 to 14 nurses each year, the program's results are easily visible in the territorial capital. Nursing vacancies are low in Yellowknife as new grads enter the workforce, bolstering the expertise at both the Stanton Territorial Hospital and Yellowknife Health and Social Services.
As the ranks of nurses swell and fewer position become available in Yellowknife, however, the health department must find creative ways to ensure that success remains a boon to the North.
The goal is to entice them to remain in the NWT rather than go south.
News/North has previously called for improving working and housing conditions as well as retention policies. While those privileges are essential to keeping nurses in Northern communities, solutions are needed to find ways to get new grads working outside of Yellowknife.
Understandably, new graduates don't necessarily have the expertise to fly solo at a community health station, which is why mentorship programs exist to prepare them with the needed skills.
The challenge is the lack of mentors in small communities. It's asking a lot to mentor a new grad while performing regular duties.
One solution would be to utilize the wealth of experienced nurses in Yellowknife. As capacity builds in the capital, seasoned nurses could become community mentors on a rotating basis, spending a couple months in the communities helping to bring new grads up to speed until they are ready to work on their own.
According to the Department of Health and Social Services, it takes about 18 months - depending on ability - to train a new grad for a community health nurse position. It may be unappealing to some nurses to give up a year and a half of their lives to train grads, but some may be willing to mentor for 12-week shifts. In the long run, it might mean filling the existing 16 vacant community health nurse positions with long-term, Northern-trained staff.
Marketing the communities for new nurses should be easy. There is no better environment for a fledgling nurse to develop a plethora of skills than in a nursing station, where duties will vary compared to specialized positions in Yellowknife.
MLAs often maintain two residences, one in their home community and one in Yellowknife, where they attend sessions of the legislative assembly.
Surely, none of the MLAs come home to mould in their walls, plumbing that doesn't always flow and heat that isn't always reliable.
Yet, that's the reality of some residents in NWT public housing.
Tu Nedhe MLA Tom Beaulieu said housing has been the number one issue in his home community of Fort Resolution since he was elected four years ago; it remains atop the list of problems today. He mentioned an elder who complained of a leaky roof in 2007 but it was only being fixed this year. Even worse, the delay caused mould to form and the house became uninhabitable.
That's unacceptable.
The GNWT is reducing its home repair budget to $5.6 million from $8.5 million in 2011-2012. How many more leaky roofs and mouldy homes will go neglected due to the fewer funds?
While some tenants in public housing are, unfortunately, guilty of damaging their homes and not paying rent, there are policy changes that can be made to address those issues. Leaving homes in an unsafe or unhealthy state is not right.
Beaulieu is a former president of the NWT Housing Corporation. He knows that of which he speaks. For the sake of his constituents in his riding and across the NWT, he must make the case for housing improvements with such conviction that his fellow MLAs cannot turn a deaf ear - and he could use the backing of people across the territory who are not going to stand for it any more.
The death of a family of four in what appears to have been a murder-suicide in Iqaluit has set off a chorus of calls for grief counselling, mental health services, and more support for child and family services.
Iqaluit city councillors have gone so far as to say Nunavut is in a mental health crisis.
According to the Nunavut Suicide Prevention Strategy released in 2010, RCMP responded to 983 incidents where people were reported to be threatening or attempting suicide in Nunavut in 2009. The suicide rate for Inuit is 11 times the Canadian average.
Meanwhile, in the recent session of the legislative assembly, Health Minister Tagak Curley stood up to dispute how he was quoted in the The Globe and Mail in April downplaying the severity of Nunavut's suicide rate, and came under fire for the lengthy delay in tabling an action plan to implement the Suicide Prevention Strategy released last October.
Iqaluit city council is not alone in wondering what could be done on their part to speed things along. As Coun. Joanasie Akumalik puts it, "When the government tries to do things, it's a bit slow."
These concerns are voiced in the Suicide Prevention Strategy document itself, which reports that during the community consultations, "informants spoke at length about the lack of implementation of government strategies, and were concerned that this one too would 'sit on a shelf and collect dust.'"
When released in October, the parties involved - the GN, Nunavut Tunngavik, the RCMP and the Embrace Life Council -- committed to drafting an implementation plan within 90 days.
Almost eight months and two sessions of the legislature have since passed without an action plan being tabled.
The basic tenets proposed in the strategy are to ensure mental health services and supports are in place, to introduce interventions that have been proven in other jurisdictions to reduce the number of suicides, and to foster community-development activities that promote mental wellness.
Suicide prevention is ineffective without mental health services, and mental health services include treatment for substance abuse.
In January, the Department of Health and Social Services put out a request for proposals for two residential treatment centres that would open this spring in pre-existing facilities already furnished and equipped. But then spring came and the department backpedalled, saying it would take years rather than months to do the planning and get the funding to get the treatment centres up and running.
These delays in getting badly needed mental health services to Nunavummiut are costing lives.
If the strategy is going to be put in place, the pressure has to come from people in every community telling every MLA that suicides have to be stopped and action has to be taken now.
Without that public pressure, the only thing the Suicide Prevention Strategy will do is what it has been doing for the past eight months -- collecting dust.
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