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From the deep, clear lakes stuffed full of Arctic grayling, lake trout and trophy-sized Northern pike, to the magnificence of the dancing green lights of the aurora - those who live in Yellowknife intimately know what makes it so attractive.

The challenge is getting the word out to everybody else.

The proposed City of Yellowknife hotel room tax just may be the ticket to sharing the uniqueness the city has to offer with the rest of the word.

The proposed tax of up to three per cent would be added to room bills at the city's hotels and motels. The money collected would then be earmarked for marketing Yellowknife as a tourist and convention destination.

The city's federally-funded 2014 Tourism Development Strategy makes the case for the tax. Visitors spent $38 million on accommodations in 2013. The tax revenue, adding only a few dollars to each room bill, would total $1.14 million.

There's no reason Yellowknife cannot become more of an international tourism destination. The 2014 aurora viewing season counted 15,000 visitors, mostly from Japan, with a growing number from South Korea and China.

A marketing strategy that promotes the abundance of culture and rugged nature of Yellowknife just needs funding to extend its reach.

The hotel tax is partially aimed at starting a bureau to target industry, trade and professional groups which seek out interesting places to hold conventions. While Yellowknife has already seen its share of doctors, lawyers and scientists, this is an area that deserves some focused attention. A marketing bureau, which would be funded by the hotel tax, could do just that.

But this is not the be-all, end-all.

Convention-goers need to be greeted with packages that offer them plenty to do with their down-time.

And for this, the city doesn't have to scramble - just organize.

There is plenty of activities - whether it be dog sledding, aurora watching or taking part in Dene traditional activities - to delight all tourists.

The abundance of lakes and the world-class fishing can be a key component in any strategy. Although fishing tourism has seen a decline over the last five years, as Yellowknifer reported last week, NWT Tourism has begun a push to revive it.

Fourteen-year-old Donny Boake, who recently secured a place on the Canadian Youth National Flyfishing Team and finished sixth out of 60 at the North American Loch Style Fly Fishing Championships last month is a boon to the city. His success is Yellowknife's success, and there now exists the potential for him to become the Yellowknife's poster-boy of fishing.

The tax is not a new concept to the territory. In 2011, the GNWT attempted to implement a similar tax that would have allowed NWT communities to decide for themselves whether they wanted to implement it. It died after some concern that the revenue generated for marketing Yellowknife would eclipse marketing revenue generated by other communities and therefore leave Yellowknife alone in the spotlight of potential NWT destinations.

But in many cases, what is good for Yellowknife is good for the territory. Although the administration of the levied tax has yet to be determined, if NWT Tourism were to get on board, as a territory-wide umbrella association, it could lead marketing initiatives for Yellowknife and any other community that may want to be involved.

The bottom line is this tax can help promote what we already have and increase the significant contribution the industry makes to the city's and territorial economy - $106.7 million in 2013.

It's more an investment in tourism than a tax.

Many adults are probably wondering how they could claim to be bored in the first place. Imagine having two months with no responsibilities, no timelines, no homework. Most adults can remember just how great summer breaks were, but forget the feeling of sitting around wondering what to do next that starts to creep in after the first week or two.

That is where organizations and communities in the Deh Cho excel. There is almost an endless string of activities for youth of different ages to participate in throughout the summer.

The longest lasting in three communities are the swimming pools. Pool staff employed by Fort Liard, Fort Providence and Fort Simpson have created jam-packed schedules to fill summer mornings, afternoons and early evenings with public swims, family swims and swimming lessons.

The pools are clearly appreciated by youth in the respective communities. Some days it's hard to move in the pools without bumping into someone because so many children have come out to swim.

Then there are the summer programs. The Open Doors Society in Fort Simpson recently concluded two weeks of its annual summer program that provided a variety of activities in both the mornings and afternoons.

This week in the village a popular science camp is underway. This not only keeps the young participants occupied, it allows them to learn and explore new concepts.

In Trout Lake youth have the opportunity this week to participate in a variety of sports and games at a multi-sport camp. That camp will be making its way to Fort Simpson the following week and will be in Fort Liard in late August.

Other camps and events are also underway or set for later in the summer in many Deh Cho communities. All of these opportunities organized by communities, First Nations and local organizations ensure Deh Cho youth have safe and constructive ways to spend their summer holidays.

School may be out, but there is no reason that youth can't still be learning, exploring new experiences and burning off excess energy and summer slushies through sports and games. The alternative is an endless chorus of "I'm bored" and "there's nothing to do."

Summer in the Deh Cho is nothing if not packed with opportunities for youth.

When you take a look at the number of community athletes who are travelling to the North American Indigenous Games, you will see a list of 23 names, not including coaches, trainers and two youth ambassadors.

There are not very many sports on tap at the games that doesn't have at least one Inuvik athlete competing.

For a town with a population of 3,500 people or so, that's absolutely amazing.

The list doesn't include some of Inuvik's finest. Chris Church, for instance, is a multi-talented athlete who tied the Canadian record in the one-foot high kick. Church is also a highly-talented basketball player. He's not attending the indigenous games, although he did last year. Other Inuvik athletes are doubtless waiting to participate in the Traditional Circumpolar Northern Games during the Inuit Circumpolar Council general assembly, which happens at roughly the same time.

Then there are some highly competitive adult athletes who aren't overshadowed by their younger counterparts.

The NWT Women's Territorial Softball Championships were hosted by Inuvik for the second straight year last weekend.

The Benchwarmers, of course, were defending their status as two-time champions, although they were in tough against a field of five other teams, including the Amirco Angels, a team on the rise.

The Benchwarmers won their third title after a struggle with the Angels and the NWT Power Corporation team, which had defeated them soundly in the round robin portion of the tournament.

Two members, Stacey Christie and Shandie Tanner, took home trophies for being the top players at their positions as well.

The question of why Inuvik is such a powerhouse when it comes to athletics is an interesting one to ponder.

While the population is small by some standards, the community is still the third largest in the NWT, giving it an automatic advantage over many of its counterparts. Still, the level of athletic dominance and skill can't be explained that easily. A very high proportion of Inuvikmiut, it seems, are simply athletic. In the wealth of activities the town affords, that athleticism has the chance to be developed properly, nurtured and supported, whatever age you might be.

That's a good thing, and it reflects well on the town.

Now, let's play ball!

Kam Lake property owners were understandably caught off guard by an average 34 per cent hike in their city taxes, far more than anyone else in the city, business or residential.

When the new property assessments were released in January, city hall assured worried residents a reduction in the mill rate would counter up to an average 40 per cent increase in assessed property value.

"There is no tax increase associated with the general assessment increase because the assessment goes up by 40 per cent (for example), but the other aspect of how we calculate taxes, the mill rate, will go down by 40 per cent," said Carl Bird, the city's director of corporate services.

Property taxes are calculated by taking the assessed value of the property, dividing that by 1,000, and then multiplying that by the mill rate.

Those whose property assessments only went up 40 per cent enjoyed a small tax increase, but Kam Lake's average assessment went up 65 per cent. With the higher mill rate for businesses -the rate by which those in Kam Lake are assessed by - the average tax bill in the neighbourhood rose by 34.63 per cent, according to numbers Coun. Niels Konge received from city staff.

Bird's response?

"First of all, I never specifically addressed Kam Lake itself," he said. "I addressed the general property assessment increase across the city."

Bird may be right, but his words have turned into a lightning rod for Kam Lake property owners who didn't expect to be singled out for gigantic increases.

Bird also says that "recent sales have established a much higher market value in Kam Lake." Yellowknifer confirmed this with Jim Weller, a realtor with Coldwell Banker, who estimated land prices in the industrial park had doubled since the last assessment in 2006.

So on the face of it, land values in Kam Lake are up which is good news for owners. That higher taxes come with more valuable land is not surprising.

The problem is the general property assessment, a costly process according to city hall, was last done seven years ago. Now, without warning, Kam Lake businesses have been hit hard on the bottom line, left with the difficult decision of absorbing the extra cost or passing it on to equally unprepared customers.

We agree with Weller, who said, "The business community wouldn't be as upset as they are today if the increases had been announced in advance and phased in gradually over time."

City administration has greatly damaged its relationship with an essential segment of the city's economy.

Mayor and council should have a discussion about what needs to be done to fix that relationship.

It was a struggle this week to try and determine what I was going to write about for my editorial.

As some of you may know (due to my frequent complaining) I've been suffering a vicious sinus infection all week and it's made everything outside of my head more than a little fuzzy. So it was a struggle, up until last night when I got to experience something I never really thought I'd see - the migration of a caribou herd.

When I moved North from Nova Scotia just over a year ago I started keeping track of my first real "Northern" experiences. The first was when I got off the plane at the Yellowknife airport after about 18 hours of travelling and realized the sun was still up at 11:30 p.m. The second was later that summer while I was driving along a highway just outside the city at near to midnight and the sky suddenly exploded (at least for me it seemed like an explosion) into a dancing flurry of yellow and green Northern lights.

Throw in seeing snow in October, dealing with my first day at -50 C, having to put a sweater on my dog who I never considered a sweater-wearing breed (reserved for chihuahuas being carried in purses, in my mind) and a little bit of ice fishing and you have some of the game-changing moments when it sunk in how different it is up here compared to down home.

Well, the evening of July 10 topped all of that.

As I watched the caribou running across the vast tundra of Iqalugaarjuup Nunanga Territorial Park with their calves following behind them I just started laughing. Yup, I straight out laughed like a kid on Christmas morning. That was the only reaction I could give because I was so amazed that I was standing there, maybe a 15-minute drive away from my office, watching this massive ritual of nature. There were so many of them speckled across the tundra that I sort of just stared at them as one moving organism between attempts to single them out through the lens of my camera.

Another thing that struck me was the way most of the people on the ridge beside me and those lucky ones on their Hondas down closer to the herd were watching, appreciating the animals and taking them in. There were a few people driving back to town with antlers and meat on the front of their machines but I really got the sense that people took what they needed and left the rest to their natural course.

It was, to me, a case of people coming together to admire the herd whether they were there to shoot or not, many people doing so just with cameras, and there was a lot of respect for the caribou among the people I chatted with as we watched.

I spoke with one man who said when he was growing up in Rankin they couldn't experience stuff like this because there were no access roads, but that he always heard stories of the caribou from his mother. I can say that I was happy right along with him that the road was made so the people can enjoy, and not disrupt, the park and all of its treasures.

Now that I've crossed seeing caribou off my list, someone just has to hook me up with some seal meat and get me close enough to a polar bear that I can snap a few quick photos from far, far away with my zoom lens.

As part of its most recent budget, the GNWT has pledged to recruit 2,000 new residents to the territory within five years - a goal Finance Minister Michael Miltenberger remains adamant can be reached on target despite the territory's ongoing population decline.

When political postering is put aside, the NWT's population numbers tell the story. According to first quarter statistics released by the NWT Bureau of Statistics, the NWT had a net loss of 321 people in January and February alone. This puts us on track to lose more than the 521 net population loss for 2013.

Despite the promise of jobs - and high-paying ones at that - it seems southerners are still reluctant to leave the comforts of the south. And those who do journey North tend to leave after a few years.

Also, more and more young Northerners are choosing to make a life for themselves down south rather than return to their home communities.

So, what exactly is causing residents to give up on eking out an existence in the North and move away?

The high cost of living is often a deciding factor for both long-term residents and new recruits. Even with a high government salary, many cannot afford to buy their own home - and for the territory's working poor, paying for both heat and groceries is often a struggle.

Last week, Miltenberger said the territorial government is looking at a variety of ways to make jobs in the Northwest Territories more appealing, including offering debt forgiveness to NWT residents who return north after school, on top of the student loan forgiveness program that already exists for Northern students.

News/North suggests the GNWT look at taking this idea a step further. Why not offer all new university grads in Canada forgiveness on a portion or all of their student loans depending how long they live and work in the Northwest Territories?

For every new Northerner, the federal government increases the health, social and formula financing transfers by almost $30,000 annually.

Perhaps paying off $100,000 in student loans is unreasonable, but help paying off a certain amount of the debt young people often accrue pursuing an education would show the GNWT is serious about wanting both Northerners to get educated, and for educated southerners to not just move to the North for a year or two, but settle here.

With an offer like that, university grads would likely take the idea of moving North much more seriously.

The GNWT would also benefit from recruiting the educated, skilled employees it so desperately needs and the entire territory would benefit from more young people living, working and starting families in the North which adds directly to the NWT's bottom line.

Congratulations to the hamlet council in Clyde River for having the intestinal fortitude to say no to cruise ship visitors.

The move should leave the water in inlets surrounding the hamlet undisturbed for whaling and fishing, two activities needed to fill the community freezers and sustain residents now and through the winter.

There is no reason that every coastal community in Nunavut should throw open its arms to visitors when cruise ships arrive. Pond Inlet, too, has taken a stand on cruise ship visitors, sending a message to those who don't provide economic benefits that they will be charged a landing fee.

Arctic Bay, on the other hand, wants the cruise ships to visit and send their passengers ashore because it is part of the tourism strategy.

There are several sides to the issue. Although the Government of Nunavut's Economic Development and Transportation Department issues outfitter licences to control activities on the land, it has no jurisdiction on the water and no way to influence a cruise ship's sailing itinerary. Cruise ships on the open sea can go where they want. However, that doesn't mean that hamlets will make the effort to play the role as gracious hosts.

There is significant work involved to prepare for international visitors. In many cases, residents dress in their traditional clothing, which is designed for cold Arctic winters, to show off their use of sealskin, caribou hides and decorative beading. That can be especially taxing in the summer months, when warm clothing is not needed. They also put up tables, gather crafts, carvings and other cultural items for sale. Many times, tours of scenic sights in the surrounding area are offered. Sometimes, there are performances by drummers, dancers and throatsingers.

Making such elaborate preparations is a gamble. Sometimes, the cruise ship passengers are respectful and generous. Other times, not so much.

The Association of Arctic Cruise Ship Operators, an international organization, has provided much-needed assistance by providing guidelines for cruise ship passengers who are interested in seeing Nunavut up close and personal. But not all cruise operators are members of the organization and some cruise ships, like The World, are not carrying passengers but is the home of year-round residents who purchase condominiums on board and are less inclined to see sights like tourists would.

Nunavut is not turning its back on an aspect of the economy that is clean and green. There are plenty of coastal communities willing to host visitors.

We recognize Nunavut is a rich tourist destination and encourage cruise ship operators and leaders in communities to open lines of communication so there is less uncertainty.

A fruitful experience for both tourists and hosts is the desired result. However, work on logistics is required for that to be achieved.

We welcome your opinions. Click here to e-mail a letter to the editor.