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The chorus of voices demanding a performance audit of the Nutrition North Program is getting louder.

The Auditor General of Canada has received calls for such a task to be done from all three Northern territorial governments, and last month, Western Arctic MP Dennis Bevington added his voice to the mix.

"This program is not serving the needs of our people," Sahtu MLA Norman Yakeleya said in the NWT legislative assembly before a motion calling for an audit was passed unanimously.

Yet, the loudest and strongest voices come from the mouths of the people, who must stomach $10 for milk in Lutsel K'e or $8 for a head of romaine lettuce in Paulatuk.

The federal government has been touting the program's success since it replaced the Food Mail program in 2011, and retailers say the subsidies are being passed to the consumers and prices of nutritious food are indeed cheaper.

But residents of the North disagree, saying the program is not working and they aren't seeing any improvements when it comes to healthy choices for a reasonable price. Northerners want, and deserve, transparency when it comes to what they pay for food.

Perhaps the most fundamental change introduced by Nutrition North is that subsidies are now provided to retailers and suppliers, rather than Canada Post as it was under Food Mail. While the Tories might have tried their best for the Northerners of Canada, there must now be an objective, universally-trusted third party to assess progress and suggest improvements.

While retailers are audited by Nutrition North, the program itself must be put under the microscope. The federal government cannot be expected to be unbiased when it comes to the success or failure of its new program. Ottawa bureaucrats aren't pushing their carts down the grocery store aisles, deciding whether they will buy milk or bread this week because they can't afford to buy both.

There is only one process that will alleviate doubt, stop the questions and create positive suggestions: follow the money.

Last month, Fort Resolution's Sharon Lafferty set up camp on the lawn outside the Roman Catholic Church and went on a hunger protest to bring attention to the community's issues.

She was asking for a meeting of the community's three governing bodies: the Hamlet of Fort Resolution, the Fort Resolution Metis Council and Deninu Ku'e First Nation.

While in the end, Lafferty didn't get her meeting, she did bring her issues to the forefront.

Changes start with an idea, but they don't happen overnight, as she probably hears from the chief and MLAs.

Committed people like Lafferty are needed in the North, especially women. If Lafferty sees the potential for positive change in her community, she should try her hand at leading it.

Lafferty was calling for more training programs for women, an improved home-care program for elders, more recreation and more programs for youth, as well as for governments to take action and make a concrete plan to help the community heal from drug and alcohol abuse that plagues it. Sounds like a platform she could run on.

This is her chance to work toward a place in politics so she will have the power to make more of the changes she wants to see.

Educators and leaders in Nunavut who are keen observers of the human condition have discovered that some incentives work to encourage young people to do the right thing.

Case in point is an initiative in Cape Dorset, where the vice-principal of Peter Pitseolak High School has spearheaded a project to offer more extra-curricular sports in an effort to boost attendance.

Simply put, the teachers are inviting students to play on soccer teams at the school. The catch is that students who want to play soccer have to adhere to strict rules related to attendance and academic performance, they have to participate in fundraising activities for sports teams to travel, volunteer in the community and they have to attend all soccer practices.

It all started when teachers observed that attendance at the school was at about 95 per cent during soccer season and dropped to around 75 per cent when a soccer tournament ended.

There have been positive results from the project. Young people who want to play soccer make sure that they go to school. We cannot overstate the positive benefits of the other requirements, which make for well-rounded, contributing members of society who understand the benefits of contributing to their communities.

In a similar vein, an initiative by Nunavut Community and Government Services Minister Lorne Kusugak has the potential to encourage young people to get involved and work toward excelling in sports. He went to bat for young athletes who were robbed of the opportunity to aim for participation in Arctic Winter Games (AWG) events. He is supporting an initiative to create an alternate event that will feature the six disciplines which will not be hosted by Greenland because of that country's lack of facilities or ability to host.

A plan is in the works for athletes in midget hockey, gymnastics, figure skating, speed skating, dog mushing and curling to showcase their abilities in either Nunavut, the NWT or Alaska because they will not be going to Greenland.

Kusugak's take on the situation isn't about athletes winning medals at the 2016 AWG. Of more importance is that athletes have a desire to participate in sports by creating a goal - an incentive for them to improve their skills and prepare to be on a bigger stage. Although the AWG International Committee made the decision not to include those six sports in 2016, the athletes will still have an alternate event to set their sights toward.

It makes sense for the Government of Nunavut and educators in the North to give high priority to anything that increases participation and encourages attendance in sports and schools. One has only to look at the number of Nunavummiut who graduate from high school to understand the importance of creating incentives to get young people involved. The latest numbers from Statistics Canada, for the 2006-2007 school year, peg the graduation rate at 29.7 per cent in Nunavut, compared to 71.3 per cent for all of Canada.

The development of future leaders and successful people is realized by challenging young people to achieve their potential through the creation of opportunities and encouraging them to create goals.

We applaud the educators and government leaders who recognize the need to create incentives to get young people active and involved.

While some children are free to enjoy their summer vacation frolicking with friends and generally doing the things young people do, others might be worrying more about where their next meal is coming from.

An article in the June 26 edition of Yellowknifer ("Children in need off the radar during the summer") highlighted an issue affecting many children in the city this summer: now that school is out, programs offering free, nutritious lunches have come to an end.

The current program in place, with the largest at Mildred Hall School, provides hundreds of free breakfasts, hot lunches and snacks to students, but only when school is in session. Now that school is out for summer break, many of these children are left on their own.

A 2011 study by Iowa State University found schools that gave healthy lunches provided many health benefits to their students, including a 17-per-cent drop in obesity and 29 per cent experienced an improvement in their health.

Pamela Weeks-Beaton, who runs the program at Mildred Hall, said she was worried that with the summer break, these children, many of whom come from low-income families, will have nowhere to go. This problem isn't exclusive to Yellowknife, it affects many areas across the country.

According to Food Banks Canada, 900,000 people use food banks every year, with nearly 40 per cent of those being children and youth. But the Yellowknife food bank won't allow children due to liability reasons. What option does this leave them?

There are alternatives in other Canadian cities, such as Toronto, Calgary and Halifax with the launch of the Feeding Our Future program in 2000, which utilizes kitchens that see little summer traffic, such as school cafeterias, to distribute free meals during the summer.

So, where is the GNWT in all of this? The current program at Mildred Hall costs an average of $250 per week, or $2,000 for the eight-week summer break. As Julie Green from the Anti-Poverty Strategy Steering Committee points out, the GNWT hasn't made a move to extend funding through the summer, but has no qualms spending $100,000 on a one-night party to pat themselves on the back because the legislative assembly building's mortgage was paid in full.

The GNWT, along with local businesses, should step up to the plate and continue funding nutritious meal programs during the summer because the need for a healthy meal doesn't stop once school's out for summer.

Habitat for Humanity NWT has run into significant roadblocks in its quest to build its first project in the NWT.

Last year, the organization purchased two undeveloped lots on a section of Moyle Drive in the Niven Lake subdivision for $234,000. During a presentation to city council last week, the chair of Habitat NWT's finance committee, Robert Charpentier, alleged the organization was told at that time by then-SAO Bob Long these were the only two lots available in the city.

Now, with construction underway on one of the lots, Habitat volunteers have realized there are significant deficiencies with the properties. Both are marked by steep grades and the underlying bedrock is "rotten." The result: constructing the first foundation went $75,000 over budget, and the contractor on site called it "the worst lot he's seen in the city of Yellowknife," said Charpentier.

Habitat NWT is asking the city to forgive the remaining $120,000 owing on the properties.

Despite the situation, city councillor Cory Vanthuyne raised an excellent point when he said it would be difficult for the city to forgive the money owing on the lots.

Two years ago, the SPCA petitioned the city to donate land for a new shelter, which the city denied.

Habitat NWT made mistakes while purchasing the land - most notably choosing to not order a geotechnical survey - but let's remember this is a volunteer-run organization that is trying to build affordable housing for Yellowknifers.

There are steps the city can take to help. Councillor and contractor Niels Konge proposed the city re-appraise the land now that it's known the lots are of poor quality. This could significantly reduce the purchase price and could be a compromise that's fair for everyone.

Casual observers of the Dehcho First Nations' annual assembly could be forgiven for thinking they were stuck in some sort of a time warp.

At a quick glance, it seems as if next to nothing has changed at the assembles in the past five or six years, except perhaps the locations where they are held. The same topics appear again an again on the agenda. They include the Dehcho Process, the Dehcho Land Use Plan, Edehzhie, the Dehcho First Nations' Master Trust and often the Nahanni National Park Reserve.

Even a quick listen to some of the conversations around the table doesn't dispel the sense that time has stopped passing at the assembly.

Every year, delegates talk about the importance of protecting the land, water and wildlife and rail against the fact that Canada and the territorial government seem to purposefully be standing in their way of doing that and the completion of the Dehcho Process.

Given all of the similarities between the annual assembles, it's no wonder that the bulk of the Deh Cho's population seems to have a very hazy idea of what Dehcho First Nations (DFN) is working toward.

It's only with close observation and visits to multiple assemblies that it becomes apparent progress is being made. The Dehcho Process, the Dehcho Land Use Plan and Edehzhie are all moving toward completion – although in most cases, very slowly.

DFN has little new to show from year to year because the processes it is involved in are by nature very detailed and, therefore, take a lot of time to work through.

While DFN may not have many major developments to announce, what it does currently have is the solidarity between the member groups. Except for Acho Dene Koe First Nation, which broke away years ago, all of the member First Nations and Metis councils had representatives or leaders at the assembly. In many ways, that is more important than flashy developments.

As long as Dehcho First Nations is able to stay united and keep all of its members, it will have the size and clout to be able to continually push the federal and territorial governments for progress on different fronts. There is, after all, strength in numbers.

One year soon, maybe not next year or the year after that, DFN will be able to make a big announcement and celebrate at the assembly. It may the protection of Edehzhie as a national wildlife area or the completion and acceptance of the Dehcho Land Use Plan.

At that point, all of the years of slow progress and familiar updates will be worth it, as well the fact that the members of DFN stayed together and saw their course through to the end.

It might be time for Inuvik council to employ a little more openness and honesty about a simmering public problem.

Last week, the lid started to come off regarding what we here like to refer to as "social problems." That's the problem with large numbers of people hanging around the downtown core, drinking in public, and generally being regarded as a nuisance.

The topic came up at two meetings, and many of the councillors were filled with indignation and vented about the issue of "public drunkenness and loitering." Yet not one noted during the meeting that many of these people are the town's growing number of homeless people. That was acknowledged after the meeting in informal discussions.

Instead, the meetings were filled with ominous talk of crackdowns and increased enforcement. Councillor Kurt Wainman went so far as to refer to the people as "ravens." Somehow I don't think he was referring to the astonishing intelligence and adaptability of the bird. It's always easier to depersonalize and demonize problem segments of the population when you're looking for a way to, let's be honest here, get rid of them.

In the tumult of discussion June 24, one councillor made the comment that a camp should be established at Hidden Lake and the downtown troublemakers could be moved there. It was unclear afterwards exactly who made that suggestion in the jumble of conversation and no one was in any hurry to own up to it afterwards.

When those kinds of ideas are being bandied about at a public forum, it's usually a good sign things are getting out of hand.

I understand perfectly why many people take offence to the antics happening downtown. I'm not too fond of the growing numbers of people hanging around the core either. However, for the most part, these people are relatively inoffensive from what I've seen. I've lived in places where I was distinctly nervous about walking the downtown areas and where the local police had some very colourful and choice names for the street people which can't be repeated here.

I believe most of our street people lurking downtown are the same ones using our homeless shelter at night. Since they can't stay at the shelter during the day, they must find other places to go and things to do to occupy those empty hours.

That makes the dilemma, at least partly, a social services problem.

I suspect some of the public outrage is also motivated by guilt. As Mary Ann Ross, a noted social issues advocate, told me, many of these people are fathers, mothers, sons, daughters, cousins, etc., and they remind us too bluntly of what any of us could become.

So my question to people here is simple. Where do we expect these people to go during the day, other than somewhere out of sight and hopefully out of mind? And what are we prepared to do about it?

Last year, after a young girl came a heartbeat away from drowning at Long Lake Beach in Fred Henne Territorial Park, a Yellowknifer editorial pointed to statistics showing why lifeguards should be reinstated.

Considering last week's tragedy it seems worthwhile repeating them. According to the Lifesaving Society of Canada, 500 people drown in Canada each year. Drowning is the second leading cause of death for children under 10, and 65 per cent of children younger than five were alone when they drowned. Of all drowning deaths, 59 per cent of the victims were engaged in recreational activities.

At the end of the editorial we argued since, it was an election year at city hall, the lack of lifeguards at Long Lake ought to be a campaign issue. Alas, nary a word was uttered as far as we can tell. And now the inevitable has happened. Seven-year-old Lodune Shelley was around the same age as the girl who nearly drowned last year, as were the three children who were rescued from Long Lake by a pair of older girls in 2003 - the first summer the beach went unsupervised.

But unlike those before him, there was no narrow escape for Lodune. He is dead, gone forever, and his family is shattered beyond grief.

Ten years ago we were told the issue was not related to cost nor the territorial government's liability should someone drown while a lifeguard was present at the beach. Indeed, Phil Lee, the former North Slave superintendent for parks under the old department of Resources, Wildlife, and Economic Development, insisted it was not a lack of will preventing Long Lake Beach from being staffed with lifeguards but a scarcity of lifeguards from the city who were qualified. The city, which supplied the lifeguards from Ruth Inch Memorial Pool, didn't have anyone who could work at the beach, which requires a special open water certification.

But things changed the following year. Suddenly, Lee was saying it was territorial government liability at issue, even while then-mayor Gord Van Tighem insisted it had the lifeguards the territorial government needed.

The true reason for the about-face, however, is revealed in the legislative assembly's Hansard from May 27, 2004 when Yellowknife Centre MLA Robert Hawkins questioned Brendan Bell, the minister responsible for parks at the time, about the GNWT's new-found aversion to providing beach-goers with lifeguards.

The government had taken over responsibility for lifeguards at the beach from the city some years before. Until 2004, it had split the costs evenly with the city. The city's insistence on seeking "full-cost recovery" that year was a deal-breaker for the GNWT, Bell insisted.

The cost of providing lifeguards for a season? Twenty-one thousand dollars. The government offered the city $15,000 but that wasn't enough for the city, according to Bell.

So because the city and territorial government couldn't come to an agreement over the remaining $6,000 - out of the millions of dollars in programming they do each year -- lifeguard services came to an end at Long Lake Beach. Nine years later it remains the case, and now a Yellowknife family is putting to rest their seven-year-old son. The irony that both Bell and Hawkins worked as lifeguards at Long Lake before going into politics will probably not mean much to them.

We will never know if having lifeguards at Long Lake last Thursday would have saved Lodune Shelley's life but as Hawkins attests, lifeguards, unlike most parents and caregivers, are trained to watch for signs of drowning, which are not always obvious to people, and can whistle swimmers back to shore when there is trouble. They are also trained in CPR.

On Friday, Mayor Mark Heyck told Yellowknifer the city is willing to re-examine the issue. The Department of Industry, Tourism and Investment, now under Kam Lake MLA David Ramsay who we were told was not available for comment, was less forthcoming.

Back in 2004, Ramsay led Yellowknife MLAs in drafting a letter to Bell calling on him to come up with the additional money needed to pay for lifeguards. He agreed that responsibility for lifeguards should be transferred back to the city, but he didn't want to see another summer go by without them.

"It could prove to be a bad thing not to have lifeguards there, that's for sure," said Ramsay at the time.

How prescient. Now that the shame of it all has come full circle, will he be the politician who finally acts?

If parents in this city have their way, nothing less would be acceptable.

The setting sun transforms the sky into a brilliant orange as I start my stroll around the dusty streets of town.

I walk down the road that leads to the dump and instead of enjoying the moment away from the office, I'm saddened by what I see. Pieces of product packaging, plastic bags and other junk haunt my every step and distract me from enjoying Rankin's beauty.

I keep walking until I come across the Rankin Inlet cemetery and discover it too is not immune from the garbage problem plaguing the hamlet.

Next, I climb the rocky hills in the area where once again I find packaging flying around. There are even a number of large discarded items, including a worn boogie board, on the rocks.

When I get to the dump, I realize part of the reason for the garbage takeover is some areas of the fence surrounding the mounds of discarded items have fallen over.

As a result, lighter pieces of garbage are escaping from the area and rolling toward the water's edge.

The hamlet should look into getting this fixed immediately for the sake of the environment and residents.

The other reason there is so much junk floating around town (and most Rankin residents are aware of this) is that there are no lids for the garbage barrels.

This means every time someone puts out the trash, they're actually providing the birds and other animals with a buffet dinner.

I think the hamlet should work on fixing this issue although, if people want to keep using the barrels, they might have to get creative. Some of the bins have been warped and won't take a one-size-fits-all type lid.

Nonetheless, when they do find a solution, the hamlet may want to institute a rule that requires residents to use a garbage can lid or face the risk of not having the garbage picked up.

This will ensure that residents quickly catch onto the new ways.

In the meantime, I encourage residents to construct their own makeshift lids.

Once these two problems are addressed, residents can take the initiative to stop littering and make an effort to have a cleaner community.

Everyone should also gather together for another big community cleanup.

It will take some time and a lot of bags, but it will be so worth it in the end.

Imagine walking down the roads and not seeing pieces of junk caked into the dirt. What a wonderful sight that would be.

• Miranda Scotland is interim editor of Kivalliq News while editor Darrell Greer is on vacation

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