Daniel MacIsaac
Northern News Services

NNSL (Jan 18/99) - At the centre of the scuffle was a 29-year-old polar bear, sex unknown, but the battle appears to be over and wounds are healing.

The rights to NWT's distinctive polar bear licence plate was one of the many issues dealt with late last year by a government committee. The committee was charged with the task of weighing the implications of the impending April 1 territorial division for the symbols and character of the NWT.

Speaking Thursday, press secretary Judy Langford said the Special Committee for Western Identity, made up of Western MLAs, examined all territorial symbols, ranging from the flag and crest to the official flower, bird and mineral.

She said temporary confusion arose when the committee announced that the bear plate, first introduced in 1970, was the exclusive property of the NWT, and could not be adopted by Nunavut. The matter was soon clarified, and then-transport minister Jim Antoine announced that there was no copyright on the plate.

"He handled it quickly, and even joked they might want to have the Nunavut bear face the opposite way," Langford said.

"There's no reason in the world why Nunavut can't have it too," she said, "but for all of the matters we have to deal with for division, this is not exactly a burning issue."

MLA Kevin O'Bryan, representing Kivallivik in the east, is pleased with the outcome but said the polar bear plate issue also reflected bigger issues.

"We're still working on the division of assets, the license plate or mace or infrastructure, so in my mind it's all open for debate," he said. "Division should be done in a responsible manner, and we should be able to sit down together like adults."

O'Bryan said that because Nunavut will have to contract out several services from the GNWT, the plate issue might even be one of those whose settlement is delayed.

"We should be able to compromise," he said, and then showed his own ability to have fun with the matter. "We have polar bears in the east and they have brown bears in the west, so maybe our plates can be white and their's can be brown."

Though he said he has tried to avoid the debate, Richard MacDonald, director of motor vehicles for the Department of Transportaton, agrees that compromise is possible.

"It's very possible to have two jurisdictions with two polar bear plates and, because of the use of graphics and colours, have the two look completely different," he said.

MacDonald said the polar bear was first introduced in 1970. He said credit for the design is another matter for debate.

"I've talked to several people who claim they designed it ... I had a call from a graphic artist in Vancouver who said he designed it while working for the territorial government," he said. "But there's another story about a student who designed it as part of a contest."

Maybe it's the mystery as well the shape that adds to the plate's attraction. MacDonald said the department sells thousands of souvenir plates to collectors and dealers all over the world. He said people walking into his office have offered more than $500 for plates mounted on the wall. He said he saw where a plate sold over the Internet for almost $600 and that plates prior to 1984, which have the year engraved on them, are particularly popular.

If there's a drawback to the design, MacDonald said it is size. The plate cannot accommodate more than six characters, while provinces like Ontario are already moving onto seven and eight-character plates.

But considering the population difference, "that shouldn't be a problem around here," said MacDonald.

Mildred Hall school teacher and hockey fanatic Dean MacInnis has made a unique plate even more special by buying vanity plates with the name "LEAFS" stamped on them. While he said he has no problem with Nunavut adopting the design, he seemed to feel it might take away from the character of the world's lone specially-shaped licence plate.

In any case, MacInnis said his plate was well received by Torontonians on a recent trip through Ontario.

"They loved it -- they were honking their horns and shouting," he said. "The only problem was that we were warned people would want to steal them."