Dane Gibson
Northern News Services

NNSL (Mar 05/99) - The Caribou Carnival Association may end up shackled with last year's debt.

Although the City of Yellowknife budgeted $17,000 for this year's carnival, the association was $6,000 in arrears to the city. That amount was subtracted from the total.

Caribou Carnival general manager John Clark presented the association's case to recover the $6,000 to council Tuesday. He also plans to bring the issue up again at the next council meeting.

"We're working with a lot less money from the start, simply because of last year's poor planning," said Clark, who took over the GM position this year.

"It's not that we're running out of money. We're doing OK but because there were bills left over from last year, it makes it difficult to plan ahead."

The association has arranged plenty of media coverage for Caribou Carnival. ITV and the A-Channel will be in town covering the event for the Calgary and Edmonton markets.

Family Channel will be sending a representative and the producers of the London, England based travel show, The Lonely Planet, will spend five days filming here, starting March 24.

Clark and his associate, Martin Gaudet, want to prepare a five-year business plan to attract corporate sponsors and outline possible fund-raising events.

"With a business plan we can attempt to create a self-sufficient carnival that wouldn't have the need for government funding of any kind," Clark said.

"The whole idea is to put Yellowknife on the map. We know that as the carnival grows, the revenue coming into the city will grow exponentially."

It is this vision Clark is taking to council. City councillor Peggy Near heard his pitch but said the unfortunate truth is the well has run dry.

"I think (Clark) has excellent ideas but the city just doesn't have the money he's requesting," Near said.

"When we were doing budget, we had a binder full of requests that totalled almost $2 million.

"There are an awful lot of excellent organizations out there that need money just as bad, if not more so, but we just don't have the money in the coffers," she added.

That said, Near agrees with Clark that the type of success he envisions is possible, given time.

"His ideas are definitely achievable and the benefits from something like that come from all angles and sectors," she said.

"But it takes years to build a major annual event. It's something you build on and that's what I'd like to see."