Maria Canton
Northern News Services

Rankin Inlet (Aug 09/00) - The hamlet of Rankin Inlet is making big cuts to reduce a $2.2-million debt that accumulated over the past year.

All overtime has been eliminated, equipment is being sold, hamlet-owned houses are for sale and up to 10 positions are being eliminated.

"Earlier this year, there was no way a person could even take an educated guess at where the hamlet was financially," says hamlet financial comptroller Greg Morash, who started his position in April. Prior to that there was no financial comptroller.

"The problem is serious, but I don't think getting out of the hole is unattainable."

Of the $2.2 million, Morash says the $1.7 million spent on the utilador project isn't the problem, but the more than $400,000 spent on general operations raises a warning flag.

"The money spent on land development is no problem because it will pay itself out in the long run, but the general operation costs are a major concern," he says.

"Bills weren't being paid, invoices weren't being sent out, records were behind and even lost in some cases."

Morash has already started collecting money owed to the hamlet, which will be put down to pay the debt.

The problems seem to have originated after the hamlet began operating without a budget last year. A budget was presented to the territorial Department of Community Government and Transportation for approval, but it was rejected and apparently never re-submitted.

Officials at CG&T refused comment on how the hamlet could operate without a budget, and said the people in charge are on holidays until this week.

Morash says it is even unclear to the hamlet as to how and why they were operating without a budget.

"Because they had no budget to follow they just spent, there were no financial statements and nobody knew what position they were in," he said.

"Under the municipal hamlet's (law) it is illegal to operate without a budge, why it wasn't caught I don't know."

Two budgets have been submitted to the department so far this year.

One was conditionally approved in the spring for more than $2 million, excluding money for work on the utilador.

A review process will be conducted in October as part of the conditional acceptance.

"We are going to maintain as close as possible to the budget, collect monies owed to us and work closely with the government," says Morash. "I'm confident that within two years we will be out of debt."