In the face of falling gold prices and high production costs, Con mine started the new year by laying off 130 employees.

There is never a good time to lay off people. If it isn't Christmas that is ruined it is a planned vacation, a new car or an addition to the house. The basic difficulty with a resource-based economy is that prices are beyond the control of the people involved. It is a global matter of supply and demand. Yellowknifers can no more affect the price of gold than we can the results of an election in Kenya.

But we can act as a community when the bottom falls out of the market. And that means everybody pulling together.

Miramar and Royal Oak, both of which have concluded they must lay off miners and managers to cut costs, gain nothing being coy about their plans.

Giving laid-off employees some notice, instead of announcing, as was the case at Con mine last month, that the jobs would disappear in an hour's time.

Creditors should exercise some patience when looking to collect bills that some former mine employees could have trouble paying. The same applies to businesses and landlords expecting prompt payment. These are not normal times and normal expectations should not apply.

At a time of year when many families have stretched their finances to the limit to meet the demands of the Christmas season, taking a hard line is likely to accomplish little. You can't squeeze blood from a stone.

Banks and creditors must be willing to be flexible with families now facing a crisis with expenses. People owing must be prepared to renegotiate their payment plans.

This crisis is survivable. With a little understanding and a little patience, we can get through it. The first step for all concerned is to work together.

As the last year the Keewatin will be part of the Northwest Territories, 1998 will be a time of planning and preparation as the road toward Nunavut is firmly laid out ... we hope.

Perhaps the single most important year in the Eastern Arctic, this year will see the bulk of what needs to be done leading up to April 1, 1999, now less than 15 months away.

What an exciting time of intense change for all those living in the Eastern Arctic. What will this change mean to the lives of those that live in the Keewatin in particular? Nunavut is not a static entity that will only start to affect peoples' lives after April 1, 1999. This next year will be a time in which answers to some of these questions will become known as people will start to see what it will be like to live in Canada's newest territory.

In the meantime, doubts have surfaced in recent months about the amount of movement toward setting up the Nunavut government. Word spread about an appointment of a senior bureaucrat to be made to assist Jack Anawak at the office of the interim commissioner in December. The appointment never came and people are still asking questions about how things are going for Nunavut.

For arguably the largest historical event that has occurred in Canada since Newfoundland joined Confederation in 1949, there has been little information about what infrastructure has been set up and what is left to be done.

We do know that the deputy ministers will be hired in the next couple of months and there has been some community consultation, but surprisingly little else about the establishment of the country's newest government is known at this point.

The electorate has been told that all is well and assured that essential services will be in place at the time of changeover. Will this mean that April 1, 1999, will only be a partial changeover and a significant part of Nunavut will still be governed by the GNWT?

With just over a year left to assemble a working government, we're told there's no need to push the panic buttons yet. Or is there? It's likely that more will be released about the state of affairs for Nunavut at the Nunavut Leaders Summit later this month in Iqaluit.
[Kivalliq News]

There are many who lament the passing of the good old days when a community could come together to celebrate without wild partying.

The success of this year's First Night, at which 1,000 parents and children turned out for an alcohol-free New Year's Eve, shows such sober community spirit still exists.

It takes a dedicated group of volunteers, talented entertainers and families who like to party together. But this year's First Night was better than ever not because booze wasn't involved but because it was a good time. Therein lies the success of future First Nights.