Up until Oct. 1, the village of Fort Simpson has been working with a rather antiquated dog bylaw which was drafted in the 1980s and amended slightly over the years. Similar to the old NWT Dog Act, the village's bylaw focused more on canines affecting human lives than the other way around.

In the old bylaw, only Section 22(i) referred to dog abuse while a number of other areas referred to dogs causing a nuisance, running at large and attacking persons, animals or personal property.

That said, the penalty for poorly treating a dog was reasonably high with violators facing a fine of not more than $2,000 or imprisonment not exceeding six months or both. The new bylaw, however, goes a step further by introducing fines for not providing dogs with necessary needs, such as fresh drinking water or suitable food, adequate outdoor shelter, a sanitary pen or a sufficient area to move.

This is no doubt a step in the right direction yet there is still room to grow. The bylaw was updated so that it fit with the territory's new dog act but in a study released July 9 the NWT placed near the bottom of the list in a report that analyzed the animal protection laws of each province and territory in Canada. This was the fifth year the territory has taken one of the bottom slots in the Animal Legal Defense Fund's report. One of the biggest criticisms of the Dog Act is it only covers canines and not cats or other domestic animals.

For these reasons, the village should have referred to Dog Acts and bylaws created in other provinces, including Manitoba which took the top spot in the rankings.

Nonetheless, the new bylaw is better than the old and for it to work the bylaw officer will not only need to continue to be diligent in her job but she will also need the support of the community. The village's bylaw officer is responsible for a number of duties and enforcing the dog bylaw is only one of them.

Part of the reason for the revision of the bylaw was the numerous calls the village received regarding ill-treatment of dogs.

Now that the officer has the ability to respond to these situations with more force, reports of abuse are even more important because a greater difference can be made.

The Inuvik Heritage Festival has been temporarily cancelled.

There's no way to dance around it, that's just bad news.

The festival would have taken place this coming weekend. It would have been a place to experience different cultures without booking an insanely expensive flight out of Inuvik.

Now, I haven't had the chance to experience the Heritage Festival yet, but missing it is not an option, from what I've been told. Food from around the world is apparently one of the highlights, and the thought of a different kind of community feast makes facing the increasingly shorter days a little more bearable.

Let's be clear, the festival isn't cancelled forever. For now, it's just postponed until maybe January or February. Different groups just didn't have enough funds for food and volunteers to prepare for the event.

It's understandable that with all the concerns raised about the economy and the high cost of living, groups have decided it's just not feasible to provide a free meal. However, putting it off until the future doesn't seem fair.

Organizer Tony Devlin said the decision was made because the food is one of the biggest draws and it would have been more like a half-festival without it.

But why not get out there and learn about a different culture? For a town of less than 4,000, Inuvik has a remarkable diversity of residents.

But it wasn't only the lack of food that was an issue. Volunteers, or the lack of them, was another big issue.

I know, we often talk about the importance of volunteers. Does it take the cancellation of a prized event to cement their importance in our minds?

There are so many causes, events and celebrations in Inuvik and you'll often see the same people volunteering at each one.

No one is trying to lay blame on people who can't volunteer. Everyone has commitments that have to take priority. Family, work, sleep and basic hygiene are a few that come to mind. And that's if you don't take any free time for yourself.

I'm confident the Heritage Festival will be back and maybe it will even be bigger than ever. But in the meantime, take the time and nominate someone you know for the volunteer appreciation dinner.

The dinner is Nov. 10 and, while it might not be a few hours of much-needed rest, it's one way to give thanks for the difference they make in the community.

We wonder if the darkened steps of city hall on election night are symbolic of the relationship between the people of Yellowknife and city administration. People pulling into the parking lot can be forgiven for wondering if anything was going on.

Inside, there was a sparse crowd of people gathered to watch the election results roll in and the usual media, with only a handful of council candidates. There was none of the breathless anticipation of past years when apprehensive candidates and excited voters thronged the main foyer, gasping as their favourites won and lost a seat on council.

This was the sorry scene at the end of the 12-year reign of Mayor Gord Van Tighem, probably the most personable municipal leader on the planet, whose door and ear was open to everyone.

Despite the low-key crowd, it was an eventful election. Runner up mayoral candidate Tim Doyle positioned himself as the voice of change. He raised issues people were talking about in the coffee shops and over their dinner tables - the problems downtown, the merits of the geothermal project. Probably the most contentious issue he raised was that of city administration's dealings with ordinary Yellowknifers.

He was not alone in that. Other candidates acknowledged they had been hearing the same thing -- Adrian Bell, Niels Konge -- and both outgoing councillors Lydia Bardak and Amanda Mallon spoke of their own problems with administration.

Even seven-time councillor Bob Brooks freely admitted he had been receiving e-mails and hearing on the doorsteps that city hall was not people-friendly. "First order of business" after the election he vowed.

Mayor-elect Mark Heyck took it all in stride, agreeing communication could be improved but declining to get into more detail or discuss personalities. Judging by his solid win, the majority of Yellowknifers support his steady hand. But that does not mean Doyle and the other candidates were wrong to raise the difficult issues publicly.

Yellowknifer has had its own experience with the wrath of city hall. After extensive coverage in advance of a referendum on the city's desire to borrow $49 million for its geothermal project, including a standalone website bringing together all the information sources and different discussions about capturing heat energy from the defunct Con Mine, Yellowknifer was labelled an opponent of city hall when the voters said no to borrowing the money.

Then there were the recent stories about the floatplane owned by the city's senior administrative officer. It was parked in Old Town close to where administration wanted to put a new floatplane dock. That fact was pointed out by Old Town citizens opposed to the dock and Yellowknifer reported as much and again later on the floatplane's new parking spot at the city public works garage. The city then advised that it would no longer advertise with Yellowknifer or its affiliated publications. During one of the debates, one council candidate repeated a rumour that copies of Yellowknifer have been banned in offices at city hall.

We have to ask: Is it appropriate for a government body to target the free press? In a democracy? What can individual residents expect if they disagree with city hall? We'll let Yellowknifers and the new council decide that.

But it's clear our new mayor has his work cut out for him. In the past, some mayors have considered themselves chairman of the city corporation and felt bound to defend city hall's actions come hell or high water.

A far better business analogy is that the mayor is chairman of the board of city councillors and all Yellowknifers are the shareholders who should and do call the shots, as we see in each election (and referendum).

We hope the newly elected councillors follow through on bringing a new attitude to city hall.

That means shining new light on the dark areas, improving communication with residents and recognizing that the newsroom at Yellowknifer serves its readers, regardless of threats or intimidation.

The past month hasn't been kind to environmentalists who latch onto every report that supports their cause, especially when it comes to climate change and the impact of the Alberta oil sands on the environment.

Today's science wars leave many wondering how so many experts can have such wildlyvarying opinions.

Further muddying the waters are hidden agendas, and those in the scientific community who have become science's version of guns for hire, mimicking the 'expert' testimony one comes to expect at criminal trials and the like.

Even worse these days, scientific studies will often be paid for by an entity with a vested stake in the result.

In fact, many simply dismiss the results of any study funded in such a manner no matter what the results.

And a fair amount of the time they're right to do so, but that's not always the case.

A recent study done on the Alberta oil sands was funded by Suncor Energy Inc., a big-time player when it comes to oil sands developers.

The study says the vast majority of pollution from oil sands operations still remains local, which puts a damper on claims from places downstream of Fort McMurray that oil sands pollution is responsible for contaminating fish and water.

According to reports in such esteemed publications as the Globe and Mail, not only did the study show negligible levels of pollutants from lake bottom sediment samples, but deep drilling into the sediment found many lakes were cleaner now than they've been in decades or centuries.

Of course critics with credentials close to study researchers Roland Hall (University of Waterloo professor of biology), Brent Wolfe (Northern research chair from the Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada) and Waterloo vice-president George Dixon were quick to debunk the results.

But the researchers found levels of airborne metals peaked in the late 1950s and 1960s, when oil sands extraction was still a concept, and then began a rapid decline.

They think the reason for the decline could be tied to the move to unleaded fuel and the closure of smelting operations at none other than Yellowknife's Giant Mine, a huge emitter of arsenic.

Then there's International Climate Science Coalition executive director Tom Harris's work claiming language tricks are a prime weapon being used in the increasingly intensive war of words over global warming.

Harris says phrases such as "climate change is real" and "we must stop climate change" are nonsensical: tools for environmental alarmists and those with vested interests to scare people into supporting multibilliondollar schemes.

When it comes to carbon emissions and taxes, Harris suggests a return to the Grade 9 science that taught us carbon is a solid, naturally occurring, nontoxic element found in all living things.

He reminds us pure carbon only appears in graphite and diamonds, and wonders if we should tax graphite pencils or diamond jewelry?

To Harris, it's silly to ignore the oxygen in carbon dioxide (CO2).

He says throwing a pencil into the air could be considered more of a carbon emission than even the CO2 from coal stations.

You can bet somewhere an environmentalist has an eraser out and is holding it in what they believe to be a firm grasp on reality.

Alcoholism, family violence, suicide and floundering graduation rates. Each of those social ills stem from a multitude of factors. However, among aboriginal people, one source is commonly cited as a prevailing cause: residential schools.

It's difficult for non-aboriginal people to fathom the effect these government-run institutions had, and continue to have, on the nation's indigenous population.

Hundreds of years ago, the lives of First Nations and Inuit people were forever changed by the arrival of European explorers and settlers. Later, that contact evolved into colonization and, eventually, forced assimilation.

A vehicle for cultural extermination, residential schools separated children from families and forced aboriginal children into a new way of thinking and gave them values alien to their heritage. Sexual, physical and emotional abuse were rampant, likely because those in charge of the schools perceived their aboriginal charges as less than human.

When students finally returned to their communities, they were, in many ways, strangers to their own people. They had lost their traditional knowledge and even the ability to communicate with their families.

The first residential schools began in the early 1800s, affecting generations by systematically carving away at the roots and future of aboriginal culture, attacking it at its most vulnerable place - its children. In stripping away aboriginal heritage, residential schools deprived children of family values, love and the important life lessons that forge people's character in their formative years.

Later, as adults, these former students were left without the skills to fully form family bonds, optimally raise their own children or develop the coping skills necessary to deal with the raw anger and pain that scarred their hearts and psyches.

Now, with the last of the residential schools closed and many of the survivors having become elders in their communities, it is vital that the legacy of this blight in the nation's past be remembered. Not only has a tool been developed to further help aboriginal people heal, but the residential school curriculum is a way to foster understanding among non-aboriginals about the impact the schools have had on past and future generations.

Many have difficulty understanding the effects of history on present-day events and that can breed insensitivity, resentment and callous attitudes. In that regard, the announcement of the residential school curriculum for Northern social studies classes is welcome. All Northern high school students will now learn the details of this traumatic era and the resulting hurt and harm still felt by some of their classmates.

We hope the result of this learning will foster a greater understanding among both non-aboriginal and aboriginals alike, help to change perceptions and aid in the healing process. We encourage the GNWT to continue to build on this curriculum and its associated resources, and endeavour to make it a model for the rest of Canada.

The impact of residential schools runs deep in the North and that history is finally finding its way into classrooms on a permanent basis.

It's important young Inuit learn how their culture was vilified by the Government of Canada, and how the scars from the abuses committed by school officials are affecting their society today. It's equally important for non-Inuit to learn this, and to understand how this unfortunate era has shaped the Northern society we live in.

A strong vein of ignorance exists today in which many non-aboriginal people do not fully comprehend the damage colonization has done to Canada's original inhabitants. Prevalent problems of substance abuse, and physical and sexual abuse are cyclical and have been passed down through the generations. In many cases, these issues have their roots in residential schools, or in the colonial mindset of which residential schools were an extension.

There is a prevalent, uninformed perception of aboriginal entitlement in today's society, where some non-aboriginal people groan at land claims and priority hiring policies and demands levied at the federal government for better treatment.

If done right, and if taken seriously by educators, the residential school lessons in today's classrooms will stave off these ignorant attitudes before they take root in young minds.

The residential school stories are, in many cases, dark and terrible, and in all cases complicated. The schools were designed to replace traditional practices with what was brought across the sea by Europeans, with a mindset that European culture was superior. Imagine being taught to be ashamed of where you come from and the language you speak. Unfortunately, many reading this don't have to imagine. It was their reality.

There were also people in positions of authority who, abusing their power, took advantage of the students and left physical and emotional scars through sexual, physical and psychological abuse. The damage done by these actions, many of which never reached the justice system, is visible today on the streets of Northern communities.

This will be a difficult course to teach. For some students, the abuses and problems may hit close to home; for others, even trying to empathize with these stories could prove emotional. Teachers must not avoid the tough topics, however. This stark and sometimes horrific narrative is too important to soften.

Hopefully these classes will not only foster understanding, but inspire hope and reparation.

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