by Marty Brown
and Richard Gleeson
Northern News Services

NNSL (Jan 27/97) - Northerners living down river from the W.A.C. Bennett dam are tired of getting flooded out.

But it wasn't only high water levels on the on the agenda when southern bureaucrats met Northern community leaders last week in Fort Smith.

Lost fish nets, lack of communication and unsafe ice conditions trouble them as well.

Seven communities were represented at a meeting with environmentalists and representatives from B.C. Hydro, Jan. 22.

Concerns spilled over into problems last summer when millions of litres -- six times the usual amount of water -- gushed unexpectedly down the Slave River from the northern British Columbia dam reservoir.

Flooding is still affecting the area.

"All we want is information and for the water controller to take us into consideration before he releases the water," said Fort Smith Mayor Dennis Bevington.

Gordon Funstad, a river engineer for Alberta Environment, admitted at the meeting that he was concerned only with the river system up to the town of Peace River, 475 kilometres away from the Northwest Territories.

Bevington said five jurisdictions that influence the Mackenzie River have an agreement to share information and set up a board to protect the environment.

The federal government has been remiss, Bevington said. The territory has been divided up but the data hasn't been co-ordinated. It takes three months for information to get from one bureaucratic office to another, he said.

In the Legislative Assembly, Thursday, MLAs discussed the fact that British Columbia is the only hold out in the information chain.

Thebacha MLA Michael Miltenberger asked the Minister of Renewable Resources, Wildlife and Economic Development what he would do to address the situation.

Stephen Kakfwi said the results of last week's meeting may alleviate future problems.

"The staff of Environment Canada finally realized in the middle of the meeting that, yes, there were major concerns...resulting from those developments in British Columbia that impacted on the communities in Alberta and well into the Northwest Territories," said Kakfwi.

A combination of high water on the Saskatoon and Athabasca rivers, rainy weather and the rush of water from the Bennett dam resulted in last year's flood.

Dam water levels at were reduced last summer to make repairs to sinkholes, natural cavities caused by water wearing against rock.

More sinkholes have been found and it's estimated $7 million in repairs will start the end of February.