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The school swap situation is an unsettling mix of government silence shrouded in mystery and pressure on school board trustees - with a dash of desperation.

The clock is ticking on the court order that mandates the GNWT provide the francophone school district, Comission scolaire francophone des Territories du Nord-ouest, with room for 90 more students, specialized classrooms and a gymnasium - among a few more specifics - to the tune of an estimated $15 million.

This must be in place by September 2015.

The ruling ordered this onto the francophone district's existing Yellowknife school, Ecole Allain St. Cyr, but the matter has since become much more complicated.

Instead of turning to renovations when the NWT Supreme Court ruling was handed down in 2012, the GNWT started eyeing Yellowknife Education District No. 1's (Yk1) schools and formed the view that the district could handle dispersing its elementary and junior high students among four, rather than five schools.

This prompted Yk1 to strike a facilities committee to determine what school it could transfer over to the GNWT. The GNWT initially proposed Yk1 give up William McDonald Middle School, but now it appears the committee is giving serious consideration to J.H. Sissons, which the francophone school board has stated outright it doesn't want.

This adds an interesting wrinkle because this school requires more than $20 million in renovations - capital costs which fall onto the shoulders of the GNWT. A report issued by the facilities committee in June notes the necessary retrofit to Sissons - which will close the school for two years - has been on the radar of both Yk1 and the territorial government since 2010, but no renovations are included in the GNWT's five-year capital plan.

Last week, a spokesperson with the GNWT's Department of Education, Culture and Employment told Yellowknifer the department can't comment on the issue because it's waiting on the recommendation from the facilities committee - which has been public since June - and for the board to make its final decision on whether or not to close Sissons, expected Dec. 9.

As John Stephenson, chairperson of the board told Yellowknifer last week: "Whatever is picked, it will be disruptive."

If Sissons closes, its students, who are all French immersion students, will have to stay together, which would force Range Lake North School or N.J. Macpherson, with have 88 per cent and 68 per cent capacity respectively, to make room.

This inevitability, which is no doubt jarring, comes down on the parents, and rather than trying to scramble up the ivory tower where the seemingly untouchable GNWT is holed up, they are seeking answers from the front lines - board trustees.

So long as the Yk1 board members do their best to keep lines of communication with parents open, and take their concerns and recommendations into account, they are doing their due diligence.

It might be time for the GNWT, which holds ultimate responsibility of carrying out the court order, to do the same.

The great equalizing factor of politics in the Northwest Territories is that territorial politicians have few places to hide when the decisions they make prove unpopular.

It's not like MLAs have an office full of assistants to shield them from the public. They go to the grocery store like everybody else, and presumably most buy their own morning coffee.

So naturally, when it became clear people were upset with their proposal to move the territorial election up a year to the fall of 2015 to avoid conflicts with federal and municipal elections taking place at the same time, they were receiving the complaints firsthand. MLAs have heard the grumbling among voters and have opted for a more modest change to Nov. 23, 2015, so long as Prime Minister Stephen Harper doesn't call a federal election before April 15 of next year. It's a perfectly reasonable date from an efficiency point of view.

It keeps the guaranteed four-year election cycle in place and still allows plenty of time for a federal election and municipal elections in tax-based communities to take place without conflict.

From a democratic point of view, pushing the territorial election to 2016 would have been just too much of an overreach by our MLAs. Sure it would have made it easier to hold an election but people didn't vote them into five-year terms with all the additional salary and perks that entails. More often than not, MLAs usually make the right decision when push comes to shove. Listening to constituents still works and this case proved it again.

It takes all sorts to make a world.

This proverb reflects the fact that in general people with all different tastes and abilities are needed to make the world run the way we expect it to. This is particularly true when it comes to elected leadership bodies.

It is crucial to have different points of view and different knowledge and experiences reflected in a governing group. If everyone in a government or council was very similar with close to identical backgrounds, educations and viewpoints, it would be difficult for them to adapt and to view problems and opportunities in different ways. Their leadership would be very inflexible.

That, in part, is why it is great to see another female leader elected, or in this case acclaimed, in the Deh Cho. Gladys Norwegian is the new chief of Jean Marie River First Nation.

Norwegian is the first female chief the First Nation has had in more than 15 years. She will also be taking a place at the Dehcho First Nations' leadership table where there are currently only two other women - the chief of Liidlii Kue First Nation and the president of the Fort Simpson Metis Nation.

Diversity at that level is important.

Dehcho First Nations (DFN) is working on a lot of complex and important issues including the Dehcho Process and the Dehcho Land Use Plan. It is important that the leaders who are dealing with these processes on a regular basis bring a variety of levels of understanding to the work.

Some of the leaders have strong roots in Dene traditions and the language. Others have backgrounds in conservation, human resources and business development. Norwegian, among other things, will bring her experiences from a career in education.

Bringing together all of those viewpoints ensures that issues are examined from many different angles. It provides a more rounded viewpoint.

It is also important that DFN leaders as a whole reflect the people of the Deh Cho. Members of any population should be able to look at their elected governing bodies and find at least one person that they can relate to or feel represented by. In the Deh Cho, women now have one more leader to connect with.

Any potential leader should always be judged on the basis of their own strengths and qualifications. It is fortuitous, however, when elected leaders compliment the groups they are joining. Through that sharing of diversity everyone benefits.

The Inuvik Chamber of Commerce is butting heads with Inuvik Gas over the complicated issue of the town's energy crisis.

In August, chamber president Bright Lubansa sent the NWT Public Utilities Board a letter questioning how Inuvik Gas was handling its operations. There's nothing wrong with that. No public institution, organization or business should be above answering a few questions from time to time, or more frequently if necessary.

At the core of the questions from the chamber is one that's potentially explosive. That's the allegation that Inuvik Gas has been feeding the town natural gas from the dwindling Ikhil gas field rather than trucking in more expensive synthetic natural gas (SNG) as was introduced in 2013.

In the letter, Lubansa states that many chamber members believe there have been fewer trucks delivering the propane in 2014 than in 2013. That's fine as an observation, but it doesn't amount to hard evidence, and that's what is needed here.

The topic is a contentious one because the price of the Ikhil natural gas on the open market would be far lower than the SNG being provided.

The question from the chamber amounts to accusing Inuvik Gas of gouging customers while using up the last valuable remnants of Ikhil.

That's an aggressive line of questioning that both Inuvik Gas and the public utilities board need to address in a definitive manner that will lay doubts to rest about what's going on here.

The public utilities board responded to the letter from the chamber by posing five questions to Inuvik Gas, including one that draws a comparison between natural gas used versus SNG. Inuvik Gas has now provided some preliminary figures on that question that show approximately twice as much SNG has been used as natural gas, which is a good start to the discussion.

Inuvik's energy crisis is an emotional divisive issue, and many people are suspicious of how Inuvik Gas operates. The company, and by extension the public utilities board, can earn themselves some great goodwill by taking the question seriously and providing a detailed response and explanation.

The new trash and organic waste bins are out and one thing is absolutely clear - it will certainly make life easier for the city and its garbage pick-up contractor, Kavanaugh Brothers.

It's a little less clear how it benefits individual homeowners, tasked yet again with doing the heavy lifting in order to facilitate the city's desire to limit the amount of trash entering the landfill.

The big-wheeled bins will likely be easier for people to roll down to the curb compared to what most people use now. On the other hand, diverting kitchen scraps from other household waste - starting first in Range Lake on Nov. 3 and then expanding to other neighbourhoods over the next three years -- means more work dealing with one's trash.

This may seem like a small point but when considering how occupants in single-family homes are already having to sort and transport their recyclables to various blue bins around the city in order to stay under the two-bag maximum, the city's compost program adds yet more responsibility onto the homeowner while doing nothing to address other trash producers, such as apartment and condo dwellers.

And the costs keep going up.

The solid waste levy was $10 a month 10 years ago. Now it's $18.50 a month.

Never mind the tax increases. Last year, the city estimated curbside compost pickup will cost ratepayers an extra $150,000 a year, not including $650,000 for the new bins and $750,000 to build a organic waste facility at the dump.

City officials, including Mayor Mark Heyck, routinely suggest the composting program will save money but they never articulate what those savings will actually mean to ratepayers.

Of course, diverting organic waste from the landfill is good for the environment. It will extend the landfill's lifespan while creating black earth the city can sell to residents to use in their gardens.

This is a noble goal but city council would do well to throw homeowners bone once in a while instead of putting all the responsibility for their green initiatives onto single-family units.

A 2006 citizens survey found a majority would support paying an extra $6 a month to have curbside recycling yet the city has done nothing about it.

No doubt, curbside recycling would come at a higher price tag if introduced today. But people would probably be willing to pay if it meant fewer cupboards stuffed with empty cans, glass jars and boxboard, and fewer trips to the blue bins.

It might even make the prospect of having to maintain a slop container under one's sink a little more appealing.

Don't be fooled by three fools with a camera
Editorial Comment by Darell Greer
Kivalliq News - Wednesday, October 22, 2014

Normally, such a thing would infuriate me.

But when I followed a link to a video sent to me this past week from an acquaintance on Facebook, with a brief note suggesting people from the East Coast aren't so different after all, it broke my heart.

I felt anger all right. But even though Happy Valley-Goose Bay is a long way from Cape Breton, I was also stung and embarrassed.

The video showed three people, mainly two women who sure as heck were old enough to know a whole lot better, pretending they were Innu from the Labrador community of Sheshatshiu sniffing gas and being idiots.

They went so far as to pretend one was a female elder from the community.

The elder's family, understandably, were devastated by the video.

This type of racism is among the worst examples because it uses human weakness to stereotype a race.

And, as we sit here in the year 2014, there are all sorts of people out there who are just bone-headed enough to believe it.

Let's be real. Every culture or race on the face of this Earth has those who struggle with addiction and/or self-destructive behaviour among its numbers.

To make light of the horror these people live on a daily basis is despicable.

And that's not even to mention the complete disavowing of any credit, empathy or respect for those who overcome their issues to rejoin society.

I cannot imagine how a loving parent who lost a child to this habit -- of any race or colour -- must have felt watching that vile footage.

I knew of caucasian people on the East Coast who inhaled paint thinner through rags, abused glue or cooking spray, and even melted down a family member's record collection for the alcohol, let alone swallow mouthwash or aftershave for it.

And I've known of Inuit who risked their lives by inhaling propane fumes to get their next high.

All colours have their cross to bear when it comes to substance abuse.

Some they share - alcohol and narcotics chief among them - some they don't.

And there are a myriad of reasons why these poor souls find themselves in that situation.

But to laugh at one another, over a weakness or sickness that affects us all in one form or another, is to laugh at humanity itself.

Now well past the halfway mark of my mortal existence, I, sadly, have come to accept things will never change, at least in my lifetime.

Thinking back of the idealism of my generation in our youth of the 1960s and 1970s, I cannot help but wonder what continues to hold us back as a race - the human race.

During my time in the Kivalliq, I have come to know and appreciate many Inuit and caucasian people who have worked hard at building bridges between our cultures and, indeed, those of others.

It is disheartening to see how much of their work, which took decades to accomplish, can be so easily undermined by three fools, a camera and too much time on their hands.

As for my Facebook acquaintance, you are right in your assumption people from the East Coast are no different than anyone else.

We have idiots among us too!

At a time when so much political, economic and environmental attention is being paid on the North, the NWT needs the strongest voice possible to represent it in Ottawa.

With NDP MP Dennis Bevington's announcement that he may not seek re-election if Prime Minister Stephen Harper sticks to the set election date of Oct. 19, 2015, a lot is at stake.

With the federal election race in its very early days, candidates are starting to come out of the woodwork for the newly-renamed NWT riding.

Last week, a few candidates identified themselves, but we would like to see more.

If Bevington, the strongest NDP candidate in the territory, doesn't run, the question of who could fill that NDP slot is a bit of a mystery.

Kieron Testart, who recently resigned as president of the NWT Liberal Party in order to put his name forward, is untested and unknown.

Voters have yet to find out who he is, which isn't necessarily a bad thing. We question whether he has the political clout or name recognition - especially outside of Yellowknife.

Floyd Roland, who is seeking the Conservative Party nomination, is very much a known quantity. Residents had the chance to get to know his leadership style during his time as premier - and they didn't necessarily like what they saw.

Where Premier Bob McLeod, who took over from Roland, has finished the devolution agreement which is now being implemented, seen the opening of the Deh Cho Bridge, completed bilateral agreements and renewed relationships with many aboriginal governments, and raised the profile of the territory in Ottawa, voters will likely have a hard time pointing to similar accomplishments from Roland. Ask anyone about Premier Roland, and you're likely to hear about his high-profile sex scandal involving a legislative assembly clerk.

The most likely candidate to win if Bevington does retire is someone with a solid track record in leadership who has the name recognition required to get the votes.

Where are the female aboriginal candidates? Former premier Nellie Cournoyea would yet make a formidable opponent for any challenger.

A federal election also means that party politics are about to sweep through the North. For this brief period, votes somewhat stop being based around how long someone has been in the North and their family ties.

Voters will be asked to choose between the Conservatives, who could remain the party in power even if people are tired of them; New Democrats, traditionally strong in the NWT but have suffered in national polls after the loss of its enigmatic leader Jack Layton; and the Liberals, for whom the young leader Justin Trudeau is making strides, yet in many ways is as untested as Testart.

However you feel about him, Harper has paid more attention to the North than any other prime minister in recent history. His government, however, has clearly been playing favourites with Nunavut, who elected Conservative MP Leona Aglukkaq. If the Conservatives win again, we can expect more of the same unless we send a member of the Conservative Party to Parliament.

While the general population in the territory appears to be split relatively evenly between pro- and anti-development sentiments, five out of seven aboriginal groups are outwardly pro-development.

If the North is "open for business," as our premier loves to say, it will be important to have an MP from the ruling party next term.

If climate concerns and sustainability are going to rule the next term in office, then voters will have a more difficult - and perhaps more interesting - choice to make.

Either way, it all starts with people who feel passionately about politics moving beyond thinking about running and putting their names forward.

Now is the time.

Opportunity is knocking and only a few are answering the door when it comes to the Mary River iron ore mine on north Baffin Island. Baffinland Iron Mines Corp.'s labour market analysis is forecasting that almost 80 per cent of jobs will be filled by workers from the south, who will be transported to Nunavut on chartered aircraft for rotating shifts.

Existing training programs cannot get Nunavummiut ready fast enough to operate heavy equipment or find employment in a range of jobs at the large, open-pit mine, which began shipping iron ore to Milne Inlet this year in anticipation of next year's open-water shipping season.

There is an estimated 365 jobs between the Mary River mine site and the Milne Inlet port. So far, only 41 of the low-skill level positions that only require on-the-job training are expected to be filled by Inuit or local non-Inuit people.

That leaves hundreds of other employment opportunities just waiting to be filled. It is estimated that applicants for 325 jobs require a minimum of a high school diploma or occupation-specific training. Another 177 jobs will require post-secondary education or advanced training in a trade. Baffinland has already paid $20 million to the Qikiqtani Inuit Association because of its Inuit impact benefit agreement but must also increase its level of Inuit employment over time. Priority is given to Inuit from the communities of Pond Inlet, Iglulik, Clyde River, Hall Beach, and Arctic Bay but no specific targets have been attached to the number of employees that should be hired.

We recognize that working in a mine is not attractive to all people and that a majority of Inuit would prefer to live a traditional lifestyle, relying on hunting, trapping and fishing to support themselves and their families.

There are many others, however, who recognize that it is possible to adapt to a balanced lifestyle.

They relish the opportunity to increase their skill level, learn to work within a large company and become accustomed to meeting the challenges of living in camp for two weeks, then returning home for two weeks to spend time with family before the next rotation.

It is easier than ever for residents of the Qikiqtani communities to exploit the opportunities presented by the mining company, to reap the benefits of a multinational company doing business on their land, because they have been given priority-hiring status and the company is developing an Inuit human resource strategy.

Baffinland is in its infancy, finally getting past regulatory, financial and corporate structure hurdles to proceed with its long-term plans, which suggest the mine could operate for the next 20 years.

As the poet Horace said, "carpe diem," or "seize the day."

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