Derek Neary
Northern News Services

Fort Simpson (Apr 14/00) - The Fort Simpson Chamber of Commerce's pipeline committee is calling upon the community's political leaders to form a coalition to lobby for a Mackenzie Valley natural gas pipeline.

Committee members met Monday morning and decided to invite the leaders of the First Nations, Metis and village to a meeting tentatively scheduled for April 26, said chamber president Duncan Canvin, who was in the process of contacting respective leaders Monday afternoon.

"Everybody can sit down and devise a game plan and see where they are as far as their support of the pipeline goes," he said. "Hopefully, we're going to bring Fort Simpson into the limelight and come off as the centre of this activity rather than the outward edge."

Liidlii Kue First Nation Chief Rita Cli said she will discuss the issue and the meeting with band council. Cli was one of the NWT aboriginal leaders to endorse a motion in Fort Liard in February to pursue the pipeline with the intent of gaining as much aboriginal ownership and benefit from the project as possible.

"All I remember when we endorsed it to work together as an aboriginal people in the valley, nothing was ever said about chambers or anything like that," she said, adding that previous attempts to sustain a tri-partite partnership with the village and Metis ultimately failed.

"But until they sit down with us, we can't make any decision. It has to be full council that decides," she said. "We'll listen to them ... and take it from there."

Albertine Rodh, president of Metis Local 52, said she too would have to consult with her board members before committing to attend the April 26 meeting.

Fort Simpson Mayor Norm Prevost said the village will likely have somebody at the meeting. He added village council has drafted a motion that they will vote on at their next meeting, recommending the NWT Association of Municipalities endorse the Mackenzie Valley pipeline.

If consensus can be reached by the political bodies in Fort Simpson, Canvin said a workshop through NWT Community Mobilization could then be held involving industry and government representatives. Training would be another essential component to look at, he suggested, as well as other potential infrastructure such as a highway.

"If we can make a pipeline happen, I'm sure the next project would be the road," he said.

If and when Fort Simpson forms a united front, then other communities in the region and up the Mackenzie Valley could be brought into the fold, he said.

Although there would be no "selling out" to industry, allowing them to come in and exploit local resources with little local benefit, there is some sense of urgency because the Yukon government is lobbying hard to have the pipeline run through their territory from Alaska, Canvin noted. He said the upside is that the Yukon is a harder sell.

"It's still a given that the pipeline down the Mackenzie Valley is the most economical and straightforward approach," he said. "We're really looking forward to getting this ball rolling. That's basically what we're going to try to do is act as a catalyst ... we're working to make this thing happen instead of just sitting back and hope it happens."