This particular house has been troubled on and off ever since it first opened as a group home for young offenders in 1973.
The coalition's Karen Hoeft heard from residents who recounted their bad experiences with the home over the years, and few want to repeat them.
But the issue remains: where will these men go, especially with winter right around the corner? To a debtor's prison or a workhouse? Fortunately, our society decided long ago that these kinds of institutions are immoral.
Yet today there are no transition homes for homeless men in this city. It's either the street or the Salvation Army's emergency shelter. For someone trying to get back on his feet, paying $1,000 a month in rent is not an option.
The transition house would ease their burden. They would still have to pay rent, but it would be adjusted to their income level.
They would face strict requirements, including random breathalyser and drug tests. A live-in house manager would also be there to handle any problems.
Great Slave MLA Bill Braden said the homelessness coalition's decision to back off was a "good call," but he didn't offer an alternative.
School Draw residents have failed to show any kind of understanding of the problem and Braden showed a lack of leadership. If they had any compassion, they would have provided at least a few solutions instead of brushing the coalition off and telling them to try their luck somewhere else.
This is not a neighbours' rights issue; this is a human rights issue. Why should one group of people feel justified saying that another shouldn't be allowed to live among them?
If we're going to get serious about the problems of alcoholism and homelessness in the downtown core, then sweeping them under the rug and suggesting they all move out to the boonies in Kam Lake is not the solution.
If, as Braden suggests, such opposition is to be "anticipated" no matter where the group home goes, then the coalition has no choice but to take a moral stand and continue to pursue the School Draw Avenue house as a transition home.
The house has served in a group home capacity for 30 years.
Surely, after all this time residents would be used to the idea.
Editorial Comment
Darrell Greer
Kivalliq News
We sincerely hope a number of Kivalliq nurses are selected this coming week to take part in a widely-endorsed survey across Canada.
More than 39,000 nurses will be randomly selected across the country to take part in the mail-in survey.
The survey will gather information from the nurses on their workplace, patients, personal health, job satisfaction, careers and aspirations.
The undertaking represents the largest number of nurses to ever be surveyed in Canada and targets all three regulated nursing professions -- licensed practical nurses, registered psychiatric nurses and registered nurses.
The survey promises to gather data from each province and territory to allow comparisons across Canada.
The idea, of course, is that consistent data will provide governments with the facts to make informed decisions affecting the profession.
Support for the project is widespread, including doctors, nurses, provincial and territorial governments, unions, researchers and educators.
In short, this survey is far more than lip service to our nursing professionals.
It provides them with a forum to have their voices heard as Canada continues to revamp its health-care system.
Hopefully, nurses in our region will have their voices heard.
While the survey is but one small piece in a much larger puzzle, it gives nurses the chance to demonstrate the challenges they face each and every day on the job.
And nowhere are the challenges greater than in Nunavut.
Too many of our nurses are overworked and all too often expected to make decisions better left to physicians.
The North, by its very nature, poses care-giving challenges alien to many health care professionals in the South.
That being said, those challenges have to be successfully met to insure we Northerners receive the same level of care enjoyed by our Southern counterparts.
Hopefully, once the returned data is analyzed and compared, it will open a few eyes in our nation's capital as to just how taxed our most valuable health care resources really are.
Nowhere in Canada are nurses more important as the front-line providers of health care as in the North.
While there is always room for improvement, they do a fine job with the resources they have to work with.
And therein lies the key.
Hopefully, this survey will be a stepping stone to improving both the number of nurses we have in the North and the resources at this disposal.
Editorial Comment
Terry Halifax
Inuvik Drum
The housing corp's $125,000 gift to the residents of Husky Trailer Park turned more than a few heads at Monday night's council meeting.
Without qualification or needs assessment, the 12 residents will receive two subsidies. The first comes on the backs of the Inuvik taxpayers and the second on the backs of NWT taxpayers.
This development will cost the town between $350,000 and $450,000, which means even at the low end residents will be getting cheaper lots than what others in town are paying.
The second subsidy comes as a direct gift from a government already climbing the debt wall.
There are people living in Husky Trailer Park who have haven't paid a dime in property tax in this town in the decades they've lived here and their rent is $250 per month.
There are households earning double government incomes living there who would never qualify for a subsidy, but here they are getting a double-dip subsidy that even politicians would envy.
I can sympathize with the people in the trailer park. No one likes to move, but it is a reality for every renter.
Had this been a private landlord, they would have been given 30 days notice and they'd be off.
But since the town had the misfortune of acquiring this property, the taxpayers are on the hook for what ever this is going to cost.
This is an election year and maybe this is an opportunity to buy some votes, but not a very sound strategy if that is the plan.
It's a bad idea anyway way you look at it.
The town has the final say in all this and I think some tough love is in order.
Go back to the original plan to make a playground and move the trailers to new lots.
I think we would all agree that Husky Trailer Park would look a lot better simply as Husky Park.
A whispered scream
I was quite surprised by the small turnout at last week's Take Back the Night rally and march.
Domestic violence is easily one of the biggest social issues facing this town, but last week's march had but a small handful of participants.
In any given sitting of territorial court here, there are probably more people facing charges of domestic abuse than were in the march.
I think if more people could see the tears shed on that witness stand week after week, they might realize what a problem we have here.
Perhaps it's because domestic violence is not "in your face enough" that it doesn't get the same support to combat as alcoholism or homelessness does in this town, but believe me, it's a much bigger problem than you see from the surface.
Just because you don't step over it everyday, doesn't mean it doesn't exist and if you don't believe me, ask a cop.
Editorial Comment
Derek Neary
Deh Cho Drum
Somehow the tune has changed in regards to a potential Mackenzie Valley pipeline over the past year or two.
Hark back to January, 2000 when aboriginal groups from the NWT gathered in Fort Liard and agreed to work together to benefit from a major natural gas pipeline running from Inuvik south into Alberta. At that time, Deh Cho leaders were willing to back the group but with conditions. Outright support hinged on self-government negotiations, then Grand Chief Michael Nadli explained.
Over the few years, pressure was heaped on the DCFN from around the North and from Calgary (perhaps Ottawa too). The Deh Cho, it seemed, wore the black hat in this scenario. Some remained cautiously optimistic, but others talked of gloom and doom if the DCFN didn't come on board. The whole pipeline project could fall apart, alarmists speculated.
Despite the coercion, the Deh Cho steadfastly stuck to their objectives. The remainder of the regions in the NWT along with the Aboriginal Pipeline Group -- the Arctic Resources Corporation (ARC) was still in the picture at that time, too -- and industry were forced to begrudgingly forge ahead without the Deh Cho's participation.
Now it seems we've arrived at a point where the DCFN is no longer viewed as "making or breaking" the pipeline.
Deh Cho at the table
So what has changed? Well, the Aboriginal Pipeline Group has secured its funding for the preliminary study stage. It took quite a while but it was done without the Deh Cho at the table. Obtaining the money was a boon.
Talk of "losing out" to a competing an Alaska-Yukon pipeline has faded. The odds now heavily favour the Mackenzie Valley pipe being built first.
The Mackenzie Gas Project (under the oil and gas consortium led by Imperial Oil) established a presence in three Northern communities, including Fort Simpson. Consequently, there has been an upswing in consultations. There is plenty of talk of jobs and contract opportunities associated with preliminary pipeline work and, later, construction of the pipeline. Yet questions remain about how well prepared the DCFN will be to capitalize on these preliminary opportunities.
Deh Cho communities, like many of their Northern neighbours, continue to be flooded with representatives from oil and gas companies, environmental firms, heavy equipment businesses, helicopter operations, camps, catering companies and others. Most of these business people are interested in forming partnerships, or joint ventures. Many of the First Nations are negotiating and signing on the dotted line for themselves.
Greater royalties
Yet the Deh Cho First Nations' negotiating team hasn't changed its stance in regards to the pipeline. The Deh Cho's chief negotiator, following direction from the region's elected leaders, is still going head-to-head with his federal counterparts, still demanding guarantees of greater royalties for the Deh Cho.
Is a Mackenzie Valley pipeline going to be built? North American demand for natural gas certainly isn't tapering off, nor is the Deh Cho First Nations' demand for an equitable share of the pie.
Interestingly, it is NWT Premier Stephen Kakfwi who now is getting media coverage for threatening to halt resource development in the territory if the GNWT doesn't get a share of resource revenues from Ottawa. The only thing that seems to have subsided -- maybe only temporarily -- is the intense pressure for the DCFN to get a deal done immediately.