Glen Korstrom
Northern News Services

NNSL (Sep 10/99) - The conflict of interest complaint filed against Hay River MLA Jane Groenewegen has been dismissed.

This finding comes from a report by current NWT acting conflict of interest commissioner Robert Clark after a complaint was filed against Groenewegen by Tu Nedhe MLA Don Morin.

Morin's complaint alleges Groenewegen did not disclose the names of those who donated more than $100 to her legal fund and that she did not file an accounting of how money in the fund was spent.

Morin sent letters to city clerk David Hamilton in January and early February asking for the names of people who donated more than $100 and for the fund's accounting.

At the time, Hamilton did not have the information, but Groenewegen's deadline for sending in the list of names was not until mid-February, according to Clark.

Groenewegen met that deadline.

"There's no basis for the complaint," Clark said.

"She had until mid-February to file and the list of donors of sums over $100 was filed on time. It was inadvertently missed in the haste of doing things at the clerk's office."

Clark said as soon as he received the complaint he talked to both the clerk and Groenewegen.

Groenewegen told him right away that she had already filed the forms.

According to the report, the final accounting of the spending from the $31,372.27 fund has not been completed.

But according to Clark, Groenewegen has followed the advice of the former conflict commissioner and he said he is confident she will get the accounting in as soon as a court decides whether the management and services board will pay all of Groenewegen's legal costs.

Groenewegen's lawyers -- Chivers, Greckol and Kanee -- submitted a $25,000 invoice to Groenewegen in October and were paid from the fund.

Travel expenses take up much of the rest of the spending.

Following the completion of the public inquiry in 1998, Groenewegen's lawyers submitted an invoice to the management and services board for $125,000 and the board has so far paid $100,000.

The remaining $25,000 on the invoice has not been paid because the management and services board has indicated it does not believe it has responsibility for that portion of the invoice.

"I'm happy that this has brought up the issue of the unfairness of the management and services board paying some people's legal expenses and not others," Groenewegen said soon after the report was made public.

Currently, $19,319 from the $25,000 initial payment to Chivers, Greckol and Kanee is held in trust.

Those funds represent the portion of the initial payment received from the fund that will be returned to the fund should Chivers, Greckol and Kanee be paid the $25,000 outstanding on the invoice to the management and services board.