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In less than two year's time, their Miramar employers will close down Con Mine. Although many want to stay, quite possibly those residents will be forced to move.
Most residents own their houses, but they don't own the land on which they sit. The land is on lease by Miramar from the GNWT.
The trailer court residents are in a tight spot. Yellowknife MLAs support them, Municipal and Community Affairs (MACA) is saying it's interested, and the city appears on board, too.
But Miramar has yet to offer any encouraging news.
Mine manager John Stard says it's a matter of liability. If they let the residents stay, the GNWT could sue them if the trailer courts are later found to be contaminated.
But last year, an arsenic report concluded that the trailer courts were no more polluted than any other local suburb.
Yellowknife started as a mining town. There's evidence of that in every nook and cranny within city limits.
Obviously, Miramar needs a clearer indication from MACA Minister Vince Steen that it won't be liable if MACA turns over that portion of land to residents. Thirty-four home owners are counting on it.
We applaud the decision by Aurora Arts Society and the city to fund painting of downtown murals.
These large-scale paintings have been eyecatchers in every community that tries them on for size.
A little cleanliness would go a very long way to accomplish the same thing.
We note with great approval the effort by the Right Spot tavern to make itself presentable: new paint and some trellis renovations do wonders. Way to go!
We'd like to see other businesses take note, too. Would it cripple The Gallery bar to give its street front walls a wash?
Would it kill the Gold Range to do the same? And how about The Diner: the food inside might be delightful, but the dirty windows, ugly spray paint that masquerades as a sign and the large broken window do nothing to make the average person want to eat there.
And what about the sidewalks all over downtown: would it break a merchant's back to do a daily sweep of the broken bottles, food wrappers, blood stains and other foulnesses?
Yes, you could wait for the city to come along to do a sweep-up, but if each street front business took on responsibility for its own turf, all together we'd have a city to be proud of. No one can be proud of broken dirty windows or blood-stained sidewalks.
Editorial Comment
Darrell Greer
Kivalliq News
Well, valued readers, my family and I leave this Friday for our first break away from the Kivalliq in two years.
And, while there are many friends and personalities here I will definitely miss during the next two months -- it's going to be great to spend some time with our grandson (who won't know us from Adam when we arrive), devour mass quantities of East Coast lobster and, of course, relax around the barbecue with a few pops.
I leave the Kivalliq News in the more-than-capable hands of Chris Puglia in my absence.
I'm sure you will enjoy his stories and opinion pieces on current topics.
A huge heart-felt thank you to all those who have contributed to the newspaper during the past two years, especially you folks outside of Rankin.
Please keep those photos and stories coming, for it's people right here in our region who make our newspaper so interesting to read. People like you!
The right decision
Thumbs up to Rankin Inlet hamlet council on sole sourcing the contract to install artificial ice this year.
There have been some concerns expressed about employing this approach.
At least two hamlet councillors wanted the contract to go out to public tender, but that would have been a bad move on the hamlet's part.
To the best of our knowledge, there are no companies in Rankin qualified to install artificial ice.
Should a local company have won the tender, it would have only turned around and subcontracted a Southern firm for the project anyway.
This would have put council in the unenviable position of paying a local company, probably more than 20 per cent of the total cost, for, basically, acting as the middle man to secure the actual contractor.
Or, even worse, hamlet council could have ended up with a scenario on its hands where a local company decided to undertake a project it had no experience at.
In all probability, this would have resulted in more problems than the hamlet started out with.
The bottom line is, the installation of artificial ice is a highly specialized and technical endeavour.
You need someone qualified and experienced to get it up and running. Amonia Master has agreed, as part of the process, to include training local staff in operation and maintenance as part of the contract.
Rankin Inlet has been waiting long enough for its long-promised artificial ice surface. Council made a wise decision in helping to ensure that the project will be complete and the ice ready when the money's spent.
See you in August!
Editorial Comment
Terry Halifax
Inuvik Drum
Where does a 40-foot gorilla sleep? In Inuvik, the answer is: "Anywhere he wants to."
George Doolittle posed an interesting point Monday night, concerning the puffed-up primate that's found his way to the rooftop of one of our local businesses.
The gorilla is an exaggeration of a much larger problem that plagues this town and that's in local building design. There is no incentive or code to prevent people from inflating gorillas or building these steel shacks that litter our streets.
While many of us here have done our time in the steel-clad Atco trailers, we really don't want to live in a town that looks like one.
I droned on about this in an editorial last year and I pointed to the big steel box syndrome, but since, there have been a few more of these monuments to Atco built around town.
Inuvik really needs to adopt a look, a feel and an attitude of its own outside that of a work camp.
I was looking back through the November 2001 Community Revitalization Plan that opens with this quote from an un-named Inuvik resident: "... Inuvik is still seen as a government-planned community, instead of just a community."
Looking through the pages of that report, there were some good ideas that have all been put on "the back burner" until the pool is built.
Boardwalks over the utilidors, waterfront development, and Jim Koe Park were all good ideas.
It must be tough to build an image for a town that is so new; I've toyed with the idea a bit about an image for Inuvik adopt. Short of stealing ideas from the Yukon, I came up with very few ideas. I thought about playing up the Smartie box houses with the central theme. Pass a law that says every building must be painted a primary colour. It would be a freak show, but it would be something real that we could all take hold of.
That could go a long way to this social nirvana we all hear about called "community wellness."
Barb Armstrong struck a chord with me at Monday's council meeting with her green team plan. Not so much the plan itself, but of the whole idea of bringing everyone together on a central project. "If we can't get together on the garbage in this town, we can't get together on anything," Barb told me one day at the dump.
I doubt that having some cheesy theme for the town or a crusading green team is going to change most of Inuvik's social problems in the near future, but I see it more as just one thing that can pull people together.
Inuvik has, for all its short life, been home to so many people who didn't belong here and many more who weren't even here, but that's all changing.
There are about 3,500 people here and we all have decided, by birth, choice, circumstance or fate, to call Inuvik home.
It seems to me that people need to get together for the simple celebration of themselves.
Be it a green team, a paint-the-town-pink committee, a waterfront development or a constructing a pyramid, we really need one thing to put our collective shoulder into.
There is good therapy in accomplishment and doing things by yourself and for yourself. Picking up garbage and painting the town could heal a lot of old wounds but, more importantly, it would prevent a lot of new ones.
Editorial Comment
Derek Neary
Deh Cho Drum
It's commendable that elders are widely viewed as respected and wise individuals in the Deh Cho. Not only is it thoughtful to seek their guidance, it's sensible. After all, they have lived full lives with varied experiences. Who better to advise others than those who have seen so much?
Elders remind us of Dene principles such as sharing and taking care of the land. When leadership assemblies get off track with arguments and bickering, the elders are the ones who step in and remind everyone to work together.
Having elders -- men and women -- at the leadership table is an inclusive practice. That sets a standard to be emulated by all.
Yet when it comes to selecting a grand chief, it looks like equal opportunity could be thrown out the window. According to at least two elders, Dene tradition dictates that women cannot fulfil such a role.
In the year 2003, when women's rights have advanced so far, that hardly seems conceivable.
So we have a conflict between two steadfast concepts. It's like the irresistible force meeting the immovable object.
On the international level, women have become presidents and prime ministers. Some run multi-million dollar companies. In the Deh Cho, women have been elected councillors, chiefs, Metis presidents and mayors over the past few decades. Women are even part of the elders council now, helping to make influential decisions. That was unheard of in Dene culture a generation ago. So why wouldn't a woman be capable of becoming grand chief?
Times are changing
While giving elders the right to pare the number of candidates is a defensible choice on the grounds of Dene tradition, having nominees discounted solely because they are women is not acceptable in this day and age. Female nominees for the position should be held to the same criteria and standards as their male counterparts -- nothing more, nothing less.
Stay or go?
It's commendable that elders are widely viewed as respected and wise individuals in the Deh Cho. Not only is it thoughtful to seek their guidance, it's sensible. After all, they have lived full lives with varied experiences. Who better to advise others than those who have seen so much?
Elders remind us of Dene principles such as sharing and taking care of the land. When leadership assemblies get off track with arguments and bickering, the elders are the ones who step in and remind everyone to work together.
Having elders -- men and women -- at the leadership table is an inclusive practice. That sets a standard to be emulated by all.
Yet when it comes to selecting a grand chief, it looks like equal opportunity could be thrown out the window. According to at least two elders, Dene tradition dictates that women cannot fulfil such a role.
In the year 2003, when women's rights have advanced so far, that hardly seems conceivable.
So we have a conflict between two steadfast concepts. It's like the irresistible force meeting the immovable object.
On the international level, women have become presidents and prime ministers. Some run multi-million dollar companies. In the Deh Cho, women have been elected councillors, chiefs, Metis presidents and mayors over the past few decades. Women are even part of the elders council now, helping to make influential decisions. That was unheard of in Dene culture a generation ago. So why wouldn't a woman be capable of becoming grand chief?
While giving elders the right to pare the number of candidates is a defensible choice on the grounds of Dene tradition, having nominees discounted solely because they are women is not acceptable in this day and age. Female nominees for the position should be held to the same criteria and standards as their male counterparts -- nothing more, nothing less.
Graduates from Thomas Simpson school are facing the choice that bedevils many small-town teens: to move on or stay put.
Even though there are a limited number of jobs available in Fort Simpson and the surrounding communities, it can be hard to break the gravitational pull of home. There's lots of talk around the region about the pipeline and all the associated opportunities it will bring. There will be labourer positions that will be up for grabs. Outside of that, however, skills and higher education are required for the better-paying occupations.
None of this year's graduates spoke of becoming oil barons, natural gas magnates or pipeline tycoons. There's a big world to discover out there. Once they figure out their niche, the grads should earn a trade or a degree and then decide if the Deh Cho is where their future lies.