Tow hill survives red tapeYellowknifer - Wednesday, February 17, 2016
Against what likely felt like daunting odds at times, a handle tow for snowboarders and skiers officially opened earlier this month at Bristol Pit - no particular thanks to the territorial government.
It was a five-year process spearheaded by the NWT Snowboard Association, which saw a need in this city and then faced the at-times-heavy headwinds to make it happen.
Louise Matthews, president of the association, told Yellowknifer last week the long process began when the board recognized that where there was a hill in the city, there would be children wanting to slide down it. This led a brainstorming session during which the board realized in order to substantially support those interested in skiing and snowboarding, a mechanical lift was needed.
While the association was the driving force that resulted in the tow line, it was a true community effort with many businesses becoming involved to donate items, work and expertise.
Although it was an arduous process - sourcing where to purchase the lift, ensuring it met the right regulations and correctly installing it - the real snags came in dealing with the territorial government, according to Matthews. She attributed the years-long process in part to the endless dealings with the GNWT, which seemed to have an endless to-do list the snowboard association was expected to cross off.
"We thought we would be close to completion and then something else would come up," she told Yellowknifer.
The red tape actually had Matthews at one point thinking she had taken on more than the association could handle, she said.
Last summer, Yellowknifer reported on a similar situation with the Yellowknife Motocross Association's planned racetrack which was so tied down with unnecessary GNWT red tape it's at least three years from completion.
While it's understandable there are major liabilities involved in big projects like these, the GNWT should be better facilitating volunteer efforts that positively impact the entire community.
Whether this means streamlining processes to make thoroughly-considered exceptions, having a staffer dedicated to help people navigate a complicated system, or ensuring the process is clearly laid out for those seeking information to make it as comprehensible as possible, the GNWT should be helping rather than hurting those willing to take on massive undertakings that benefit everybody.
Keep domestic violence program aliveYellowknifer - Wednesday, February 17, 2016
An innovative program that tackles domestic violence at its root faces an uncertain future and like many of the men it helps is a work in progress that needs further support.
A New Day, a community-based government program that helps men who have been abusive, or fear becoming abusive in family relationships, has helped more than 130 men since it started two years ago. It is offered through family-support organizations and the courts. Men can refer themselves. The program offers individual and group counselling to help them deal with anger issues by building on positive traditional values, deal with past trauma and taking responsibility for their actions.
Program co-ordinator Laura Boileau says facilitators see new clients almost daily, a testament to its success.
A New Day works by being proactive, she explained, by diverting men from the court system and working on what is causing the problem and preventing future incidents, rather than dealing with the fallout through the courts and medical system.
Funding for the program is slated to end on Dec. 31. After that, the GNWT, namely the Department of Justice, will look at the results and decide whether it shall continue in its present form. Boileau would like to see the program continue, which currently costs $250,000 annually to run. That is a small price to pay considering the untold millions it costs to process domestic violence offenders through police and courts.
MLAs should keep that in mind when deciding how to proceed in a time of fiscal restraint.
Circus of justiceEditorial Comment by Darrell Greer
Kivalliq News - Wednesday, February 17, 2016
One of the biggest problems with the instant-access world we live in today is the circus atmosphere that often surrounds events that are anything but funny.
On some level within our psyche, no matter what the subject matter, once a circus atmosphere is established we think, "Send in the clowns."
Such is the totality of the human mind, conscious and unconscious, from which the term is derived.
And we didn't need a lot of help to begin with.
Even before the Internet ruled entirely, morbid jokes made the rounds literally days, if not hours, after the Challenger space shuttle disaster on Jan. 28, 1986.
Images of the Challenger explosion were everywhere, flickering on TV channels, broadcast over AM and FM radio waves, and plastered on countless newspapers and magazines.
And it brought out the worst in many people.
Fast forward to the OJ Simpson murder trial in 1995 and the same applies.
It seemed for every person invested in seeing justice delivered, one way or the other, in the final outcome, thousands of others were wrapped-up in the celebrity of the spectacle.
Ask 10 people who OJ's main lawyer was and I'd wager nine would answer Johnnie Cochran.
Ask them the names of the two people murdered in the case and, well, not so many would answer correctly.
Fast forward to today, and Canada has its own trial turned celebrity circus in the Jian Ghomeshi sexual assault trial.
Defence lawyer Marie "Hand Grenade" Henein became the ringmaster and evil villain, with even her $1,500 shoes scrutinized for the subliminal message they send.
Crown prosecutor Michael Callaghan was Henein's well-meaning, but bumbling foe, always unprepared or ill-informed.
That is, as long as you're blissfully ignorant of the fact the defence does not have to disclose anything to the Crown under Canadian law.
As Henein shredded the alleged victims' testimony, as if hit by so many pieces of razor-sharp shrapnel, Ghomeshi faded into the background.
People voiced their utter disdain for the villainous Henein over social media.
And, without taking a moment to consider the effects of trauma, they sneered at the actions of the alleged victims that were unmasked by Henein.
No matter what verdict the wise and elder-like Judge William Horkins delivers on March 24, the spectacle the trial became will, by itself, dissuade Lord-only-knows-how-many victims of sexual assault from coming forward.
Why bother? The circus has seen to that.The entire debacle has become a stain on the Canadian judicial system, regardless of the outcome.
Come April, our villain will be purchasing her next pair of shoes that say, "I'm all that," Judge Horkins will play 18 holes of golf while wondering if he'll ever get to see his beloved Maple Leafs play in May again, Callaghan will remind himself he is a successful prosecutor, and the minor players in the three-ring debacle, the alleged victims and perpetrator, will become mere footnotes.
Send in the clowns indeed!
Community liaisons could speed up emergency helpNorthwest Territories/News North - Monday, February 15, 2016
The morning 23-year-old Charlotte Lafferty was left bloody, beaten and dead outside the elder's centre in Fort Good Hope has shed light on a problem with the territory's emergency response protocols.
Elder Barthy Kotchile doesn't speak English very well but he was the first to report Lafferty's injuries to the RCMP.
Because there was nobody at the Fort Good Hope detachment at the time, his call was redirected to Yellowknife.
It is clear from listening to a recording of the emergency call, which was submitted during the trial as evidence, Kotchile and the emergency dispatcher did not understand each other.
In the recording, Kotchile is clearly distressed, switching between Slavey and English, exclaiming about a woman being beaten "outside the duplex."
This wasn't enough information for the dispatcher to get an officer on scene, and in this situation where every second counted, RCMP was not able to respond quick enough to save Lafferty's life.
How can emergency response times be sped up? They could if every community had its own emergency dispatch liaison, who could field calls in English and his or her community's predominant language, and relay that information to the local RCMP 24/7.
Beyond speaking to callers in the language they are most comfortable, this person would know the community.
They would know what a caller might mean when he or she says something is happening outside "the duplex," for example.
The territorial government has a wealth of resources in the members of its smaller communities.
If the government would open up to recruiting people into liaison roles like this, it would make emergency, police and health services that much more effective.
An essential member of the communityNorthwest Territories/News North - Monday, February 15, 2016
Today in the NWT it can be difficult for elders, who grew up speaking their indigenous language, to do things like go to a doctor, report a crime to a police officer or fill out a tax form.
This is the situation in many of the territory's communities, where elders today speak little English, if any at all, making seemingly simple tasks taxing, confusing, stressful experiences.
This is why people like Lianne Mantla, a Tlicho-speaking Behchoko resident who works as a nurse in her own community, are so valuable.
As Mantla says herself in the Feb. 8 News/North article ("The language of wellness"), she has worried about the information that gets lost in translation when a patient describes his or her health issues through a translator or worse, broken English without the help of a translator, so she left Behchoko to study nursing at Aurora College, finished her degree in Alberta and returned home to pursue her career.
She wasn't sure she would be accepted in Behchoko because she felt residents might be reticent to share details about their private health issues with somebody they grew up with in this tiny community. As it turns out, she was not only accepted but has been celebrated.
She was recently awarded a Tlicho Government Health and Government Award and Inuit Health Branch Award of Excellence in Nursing award from Health Canada.
The territory needs more people like Mantla, people who are willing to leave their community and bring back an career skill coupled with traditional and cultural knowledge.
Nunavut deserves special treatment for federal funding Nunavut/News North - Monday, February 15, 2016
There are more than a few things that are special about Nunavut.
At more than two million square kilometres (787,000 square miles), it is the largest single land mass under one jurisdiction in Canada.
It is Canada's northernmost territory, reaching far above the Arctic Circle.
It is the newest established part of Canada since coming into existence under its own government on April 1, 1999.
Nunavut is also special for the high percentage of its population being of the same ethnic origin, Inuit.
There are many things that make Nunavut unique, unlike any other part of Canada in so many ways.
But it is its status as the least populous area of Canada that really puts the icing on the argument that Nunavut needs to be treated in a special way.
Case in point is the federal government's Building Canada fund. That is the pot of money Ottawa has set aside for big infrastructure projects, like bridges and roads.
The $14-billion, 10-year program that started in 2014 provides money on the condition that a lower level of government shares in the cost. Quite often, Ottawa will provide 75 per cent of the cost while, in the case of Nunavut, the territory pays for the remaining 25 per cent. That is fair to both levels of government.
Another guideline used to award financing for capital projects from the Building Canada fund is not fair. In fact, we agree with a report by the National Aboriginal Economic Development Board, which is calling for changes to the way infrastructure money is spread across the country.
The practice of awarding funds based on population is shortchanging Nunavut. With approximately 30,000 residents, a per capita funding formula would award the entire territory of Nunavut the same amount of money as one small neighbourhood in a major Canadian city, simply a drop in the bucket.
Since the federal Liberal government has come to power, there has been talk that there was only about $10 billion left in the fund. Alberta just got a big chunk of that money toward infrastructure so that province, which is struggling with low oil prices, can put its unemployed oilpatch workers on infrastructure jobs.
The National Aboriginal Economic Development Board is recommending Ottawa set up a new fund specifically for Northern infrastructure. We couldn't agree more.
Nunavut deserves special treatment by virtue of its special features, which not only make it unique but also more costly and more challenging than other parts of Canada.
With no roads to southern Canada and its dependence on air transportation for goods and services, there is no question that Nunavut can justify its need for special treatment.
A $1 billion problem Weekend Yellowknifer - Friday, February 12, 2016
The territorial government and the Union of Northern Workers must work together now to ensure the people of the NWT are served well in these difficult economic times.
The territory is fast approaching $1 billion in debt. Thanks in part to the loss of $34.2 million in federal grant money, the GNWT anticipates it will reach that milestone by the 2019-20 fiscal year.
Lest that milestone become an economic hurdle that forces the GNWT's future hands into making drastic and painful cost reductions, the territory must find efficiencies and savings now to reverse or at least slow our economic decline.
The first priority should be to recover the funding wiped off the balance sheet thanks to numerical jiggery-pokery by the federal government. The Liberal Party, having freshly swept the electoral North, must be held to account for this.
What has our MP Michael McLeod done for us on this account so far?
A second priority, but equal in importance, is for the GNWT and its workers union to recognize that fiscal restraint is in order to protect services and programs for the people they represent.
Do whatever possible to avoid cuts to important arts and cultural programs. Do not ignore or scrimp on the education or health care needs of the young or elderly.
Any new benefits the GNWT extends to its already very well-compensated employees, whether through union pressure or not, will be seen in a very negative light if they are followed by cuts to the services Northerners need and value.
Freeze hiring if need be. Reward employee-found cost-savings with extra vacation time, for example, to promote a work culture of efficiency not complacency.
Maybe the GNWT could consider staying-put in the buildings it owns now and put off building any more.
There may be savings found in privatizing services that currently run at a cost to the government.
There is no reason to look at our looming $1 billion debt hole as an unavoidable inevitability.
Pioneers saw big bucks in Northern lights Accessibility audit could open doors - Friday, February 12, 2016
Ensuring all residents in the city have access to the services they pay for in property taxes and user fees seems like no brainer but this may not be the case for some people with disabilities.
In considering an accessibility audit, city administration has acknowledged that people who require the use of canes, walkers and wheelchairs may not be able to get around the city as easily as other people
This is a good move.
The NWT Disabilities Council released a survey last year showing one third of 300 respondents with disabilities saying they had difficulty with physical barriers throughout the territory.
It's reasonable to presume people with disabilities are most aware of the accessibility issues in the city. They deal with them every day.
Yellowknifer reporter Meagan Leonard had a look around town for herself and found many downtown businesses are not fully accessible. Centre Square Mall, for instance, has no wheelchair-accessible ramp between the upper and lower levels. This means people unable to navigate stairs - this would include parents with baby strollers - must exit the building to access another level of the mall.
Clearly there is a problem. Now it's time to find a solution.
A carefully considered accessibility audit has the potential to do just that, if it is guided and informed by people with disabilities. The phrase "nothing about us, without us" has been adopted by disabilities activists and would be an ideal rule of thumb to follow here.
Those who push this policy need not be motivated by altruism. If properly accommodated, people with disabilities will be more motivated to stay in the NWT, meaning the $28,351 in per capita federal funding the territorial government receives for each resident will remain. Furthermore, everyone ages, and some who find buildings perfectly accessible today may find themselves grateful for structural accommodations a few decades down the road.
Keep rent lowDeh Cho Drum - Thursday, February 11, 2016
Councillors present at the village's committee of the whole meeting showed wisdom in their decision to keep rent at current levels for the Open Doors Society and Open Sky Creative Society on Feb. 8.
The decision is not binding until it passes through regular council. However, it promises to bring some measure of relief to patrons and organizers of the two societies.
As nonprofit organizations, they provide a wealth of programming at low or no cost to Fort Simpson. For Open Sky, that reach extends to the entire Deh Cho and even elsewhere in the Northwest Territories.
With the programming of these nonprofits now relatively safe, one issue for certain has emerged from the discussions to increase rent: the Fort Simpson recreation centre is in dire need of upkeep.
Between paying large bills for both heat and power, it appears the building's other maintenance needs have been neglected.
When lease agreements for Open Doors and Open Sky initially came up, village council and administration were faced with the tough decision of finding a way to bring in some much-needed maintenance money or continue to watch as the building deteriorates.
They chose action.
There is no shame in the fact they have now forestalled that action due to the effect it would have on Open Doors and Open Sky.
Rather, to the contrary, that decision shows forward-thinking to be expected from municipal leaders.
It also shows how valuable such organizations are to the village - and that the village understands and respects that value.
Those at the committee meeting on Feb. 8 witnessed something many municipalities strive for: a considerate committee who could see beyond their own needs.
Additionally, the meeting showed the fortitude of Fort Simpson's volunteers.
Rather than trying to draw blood from a stone, societies were able to successfully argue their cases and show the village why rent increases would be bad.
The result was a reasonable solution for everyone.
In closing the book on a rent increase, the village must now pursue alternative means of funding for maintenance of the recreation centre - means they likely would have had to pursue in the first place, given how little the rent from Open Doors and Open Sky would cover.
That could mean cuts to their budget elsewhere, or it could mean seeking out grants and funds from other organizations.
Luckily, the village seems to have some options open when it comes to recreation dollars. The same cannot be said for nonprofit societies when it comes to their budgets.
Bylaw debate scratches surfaceInuvik Drum - Thursday, February 11, 2016
If last week's public meeting about the liquor bylaw proved anything, it is that Inuvik's problems with alcohol run just as deep as everyone thought.
Not only were the vast majority of attendees vehemently against a change that would see bars allowed to open on Sundays and Good Friday, some even suggested that legislated closures should be extended more than they are now. When asked if that were possible, Mayor Jim McDonald said it was certainly something he and council could look into.
Obviously this is bigger than the Sunday question.
Everyone who spoke out against the proposed change had personal stories to tell, painful stories of childhood abandonment, abuse and rejection of alcohol themselves.
Many, some subtly and some less so, advocated for prohibition on some level.
It's no secret that prohibition doesn't work, but it's equally clear that whatever we're doing now isn't working either.
That being said, blaming alcohol for the breakdown of family ties and faith is also something of a red herring. Alcohol abuse is a symptom of greater problems, not the problem in and of itself.
Harkening back to a time when Sundays were spent with family, going to church, and people only drank to have fun is wilful illusion at best.
At the end of the day, people who want to drink -- who need to drink -- are going to find ways to do it. Bootleggers are always an option, as are various common household items for the truly desperate. Once again, the drink is not the problem. The problem is what causes the deep wounds within the people doing the drinking.
It's easy to look to other jurisdictions where bars are open 364 days a year and ask why Inuvik should be different. But the reality is that Inuvik -- the North -- is different. There are a multitude of experiences and issues here that other places just don't have, or witness to a far lesser extent. For those reasons, the North needs its own remedies.
There have been initiatives and good people doing good work to help those turning to the bottle, but we need more.
Cutting down the hours bars can serve liquor, or simply keeping them where they are now, is an attractive but ultimately inadequate solution.
Sixty people isn't the highest turnout a public meeting has ever drawn, but we would argue the emotion those 60 people brought to the Feb. 3 public meeting rivals the most well-attended meeting.
