July 1 is the date medical specialists have set for settling their contract dispute with the territorial government. If they have no deal by then, they will resign.

Despite the looming deadline, no talks are scheduled between doctors and the GNWT until June 28. That's cutting it mighty close.

Both sides must clear their calendars, and get down to talks right away, today if possible, tomorrow if not.

The public can help, too. Call your MLA. Talk to your doctor. Let them know that they're not doing their jobs if they don't sit down to talk and settle this dispute before there's a real and prolonged health care crisis.

When the territorial government first proposed forming a new sports and recreation board last year, we asked why.

A year later, the government still hasn't answered the question to everyone's satisfaction.

They want to help smaller communities organize sports and recreation activities.

To do so, a new board would be struck that would include recreation co-ordinators, the Aboriginal Sports Circle and Sport North. It would have control over $2.5 million in annual lottery revenue plus another $725,000 from the territorial government. There was also talk last year of unspecified funding from the federal government.

Sport North doesn't like what it sees and has threatened to pull out of the process.

The debate over how to improve sport and recreation in the NWT has become a political tug of war.

The Aboriginal Sports Circle says Sport North spends too much money on staff and administration and has failed aboriginal athletes. Municipal Affairs Minister Vince Steen has suggested Sport North be disbanded in favour of this new organization.

Sport North has a staff of 15, including the six who run the lotto terminals. It represents 27 territorial sport organizations and has three affiliate members.

Its 10-person board has members from around the NWT. President Abe Theil said the organization knows more must be done.

Creating a new board where one is already in place seems like a duplication. The only explanation is that the government is unhappy with the job Sport North is doing.

If that's true, say so.

This tug of war over a tiny amount of cash will only hurt efforts to deliver sport and recreation programs around the NWT.

Shrimp may be small, but they could mean big things for Nunavut.

Unfortunately, the federal government doesn't understand the importance of building an economic base for Nunavut.

Isolated by climate and geography, Nunavut has few options for jobs and wealth.

This territory must rely on natural resources for building a future.

Natural resources are more than oil, gas, diamonds, gold and other metals to be mined from the frozen land. Under Davis Strait, there are shrimp, a fishery worth tens of millions of dollars.

Nunavut should have received the lion's share of the shrimp catch. Instead, the federal department of fisheries and oceans gave most of the quota to fishers from far away Newfoundland and Nova Scotia.

It looks like a political payoff to keep eastern members of parliament from feeling the wrath of Atlantic Canadians who have fished out their own waters.

Without most of the shrimp, Nunavut can't invest in vessels and processing plants to build its economy.

The territorial government should follow through on its threat to sue Ottawa. Courts may be the only way to get Nunavut its fair share of the fishery.

As keepers of the land, Inuit organizations must also be keepers of the culture.

To save one without the other would be to lose an important part of traditional Inuit life. Yes, children must learn culture and language from parents and grandparents. Educational institutions must also provide programs that teach Inuit and non-Inuit alike about the culture and language of Nunavut.

Arctic College does that through its language and culture program, but it was jeopardized due to a lack of funding.

Thanks to the Qikiqtani Inuit Association, 10 students can take the two-year diploma program with the infusion of $126,523.

The Nunavut government must take some blame for failing to provide funding that kept up with needs. The situation, however, has helped QIA beef up its role as keeper of the culture.

This funding not only helps students develop their understanding of culture and language, but enhances the college's Inuit Qaujimajatuqangit (IQ) as well.

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.