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If the Northwest Territories is ever going to make a truth out of the oxymoron that is "sustainable development," then it will take a strong, independent regulatory system to get there.

Earlier this month, the Mackenzie Valley Land and Water Board proved that it is up to the task of keeping resource extraction companies in check. It denied Strategic Oil's request to keep a waste water spill out of the public eye - one that affected 1.5 square kilometres about 100 km south of Kakisa on Aug. 14.

As a Strategic spokesperson re-iterated to News/North last week, this was a relatively small spill and it is believed to have been cleaned up quickly and thoroughly.

However, a spill is a spill and the fact that the Calgary-based company even entertained the idea of keeping the spill secret, along with (more importantly) the fact the company was surprised its e-mails to the land and water board were being put on the public record, is telling. Clearly, this junior oil company does not fully understand the way things are done in the North. Chances are this is not the only company currently operating up here with this knowledge gap.

As Enterprise Mayor John Leskiw II said, it is incidents exactly like this one that cast doubt on information provided by companies when leaks and spills happen.

"If it is as safe as they say, then why are they trying to hide it?" he asked.

Why indeed.

In a very strongly-worded response, a letter signed by board chair Willard Hagen reminds the company that the land it is operating on is a traditional harvesting area. The board expects Strategic to leave the land in a condition where it can continue to be used for harvesting in the future.

In his rebuff to the request to keep the correspondence private, Hagen writes that the board takes its responsibility to be transparent and accountable to those living in the Mackenzie Valley very seriously, and that Strategic and other companies like it would be wise to do the same.

Although those at the land and water board were simply following their own policies in how they handled this request, their response deserves praise.

It shows that the Mackenzie Valley Land and Water Board specifically, and regulatory boards in the NWT in general, are not the dinosaurs moving at glacier speed that the federal government and industry would have us believe.

While the history of development in the territory is indeed fraught with lengthy delays in having projects approved, those delays have almost always been a direct result of either waiting for companies to file the proper information, or of a file sitting on a federal minister's desk for years before getting the rubber stamp of approval.

And yet, it is an imperative of the sitting federal government to come in and overhaul this system. In the short-term, Ottawa's now-approved superboard is bound to cause more delays in having projects approved. How could upending board staff and reducing the number of working board members do anything else?

There is still no plan on how to deal with the cumulative impacts of continuous development in the regions. The system is still tethered to looking at projects individually and it seems that no matter how many elders stand before them and make impassioned speeches about all the ways they have seen their lands poisoned within their lifetimes, it is not something the old dinosaur yet knows how to deal with.

With fewer staff and fewer board members, this is not likely to improve any time soon.

With the Tlicho Government's court injunction seeking to stop the dismantling of the regional land and water boards, there is still hope that the federal government could see the errors of its ways and stop meddling in board affairs.

Both the federal and territorial governments say the North can be opened for business sustainably. Leaving one of the strongest regulatory systems in the country alone to do its job would be a good way to prove they mean it.

The process for Nunavut residential school survivors to make use of a $3,000 personal education credit is nothing short of an outrage.

As detailed in two news stories last week, former students who received a common experience payment are eligible to receive $3,000 from the Indian Residential School Settlement Agreement for education. The credit can also be transferred to an immediate family member, like a son or daughter, to assist in the cost of their post-secondary institution, providing the institution is on the list of approved institutions.

Any right-thinking individual would want to take advantage of $3,000 awarded to them as part of a settlement. The problem in this case is that many residential school survivors are above age 60 and, in order to use the money, are being forced to undergo the extensive ordeal of reading 28 pages of highly technical information, navigate an unworkable website on the Internet and go through a process that is completely foreign to their normal way of life. Applicants are expected to select a course for themselves or a relative, fill out an application form by Oct. 31, take it to an approved educational institute to be completed, then seek approval before Dec. 1.

The process is a debacle for a number of reasons.

Considering that the money originates from a fund intended to make amends for a system which attempted to destroy aboriginal culture and force Inuit and First Nations people to assimilate to the English colonial lifestyle, the onerous process adds insult to injury.

Offering residential school survivors $3,000 to go back to school is also questionable. The classroom and the school experience is where the abuse happened in the first place. It is easy to understand why survivors would not want to put themselves into an educational program outside of their community again.

Survivors would like to see a positive benefit from the education credit fund, which is believed to be worth not less than $200 million. As it stands, remaining money after Dec. 1 will flow to the National Indian Brotherhood Trust Fund and the Inuvialuit Education Foundation to fund their own educational programs.

There are better options, as was discovered through research by one applicant.

Money from several applicants can be pooled and used to fund cultural experience camps, where elders can pass on traditional knowledge to young people and family members.

Obviously, there are many reasons for the application process to be improved so school survivors can make good use of the funding while maintaining their dignity.

Aboriginal Affairs and Northern Development Canada Minister Bernard Valcourt needs to stand up, do the right thing and call for the program to be reviewed and changed so survivors can realize a true benefit without having to jump through impossible hoops.

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!

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