Commission struggles with land use plan
Retroactive funding increase allows for Nunavut Planning Commission to schedule preliminary meetings but not public hearing itself
Michele LeTourneau
Northern News Services
Monday, May 11, 2015
NUNAVUT
The Nunavut Planning Commission is moving ahead with preparations for a public hearing on the draft Nunavut Land Use Plan (NLUP) - with two meetings scheduled to take place in Iqaluit - but it still needs federal funding for the hearing itself.
"Those meetings are steps that we have to go through prior to holding the public hearing," said commission chairperson Hunter Tootoo.
Funding for the public hearing remains subject to judicial review.
The first meeting, for technical experts, is to be held June 23 to 26 at the Cadet Hall in Iqaluit, and a pre-hearing conference is scheduled for July 14 to 16.
The purpose of the public hearing is to offer parties a venue to present comments and rationale after each has reviewed the plan.
Covering two million square kilometres, the plan is intended to provide for the conservation, development and utilization of the land.
Following the hearing, a final draft would be presented for approval to Aboriginal Affairs and Northern Development Canada Minister Bernard Valcourt.
The commission can move forward with pre-hearing meetings due to a 25 per cent increase to its core funding, retroactive to 2013, announced as part of a settlement agreement between Nunavut Tunngavik Inc. and the governments of Canada and Nunavut. The Nunavut Impact Review Board and the Nunavut Water Board, meanwhile, both received a 55 per cent retroactive increase in funding.
"With the 25 per cent increase and the retroactivity, we were able to identify $1.2 million to cover public hearing-related costs, these two meetings and the prep work to get ready for the hearing. We can do that this year because of the retroactivity, but only this year. With the ongoing budget of $5.2 million we would not be able to do something like that," said Tootoo.
Originally, the public hearing was planned to take place in Iqaluit in the fall of 2014, with a proposed cost of $1.7 million, in order to meet a deadline for the draft land use plan of March 31 imposed by Valcourt. At the time, AANDC refused to provide funding specifically for the hearing.
"They've since changed their mind on the deadline. There's no deadline in place right now," said Tootoo.
Valcourt's office told Nunavut News/North by email, "There are no statutory deadlines for the completion of the NLUP."
The commission's lawsuit is still pending and Tootoo is hopeful there will be a resolution.
"It's not dropped. One of the things I did when I first (was appointed in January) is I said, 'We don't want to be in court.' I met with Minister Valcourt. I had our officials talk with their officials and had it put on the backburner until June. Hopefully by then we can resolve the issue and move forward without having to go through that process. It's no good to be in there fighting with each other. Let's just find a way to resolve it."
Valcourt's office would only repeat, "We have invested significant funding for the development of the land use plan. The Nunavut Planning Commission received more than $54 million in core funding. As this matter is now before the courts, we cannot comment further."
However, the commission's position based on the Nunavut Land Claims Agreement is that a public hearing is subject to supplementary funding, meaning extra funds provided by the federal government not included in the commission's annual budget are required.
The proposed cost of the hearing itself is now $1.2 million and Tootoo said he was sending an official letter last week requesting those supplementary funds again.
Tootoo also notes an improved relationship with the federal department.
"There's now a willingness to sit down and discuss the issues," he said, adding supplementary funding, such as those provided to other institutions of public government, is the main issue.
"We need to have access to that because, for example, the early revenue phase public hearing we did for Baffinland a couple of years ago was just under a million dollars. If all of a sudden we get three or four of the applications coming in, that's almost all our complete budget."
Going forward, the 25 per cent increase to core funding will help with understaffing at the organization, says Tootoo. The commission, with 13 staff currently, desperately needs to get staff in place to deal with work coming up. A full staff would mean 39 personnel.
"We've got conformity decisions to do. With the announcement that the (Nunavut Planning and Project Assessment Act) will be coming into effect in the summer, that's going to put a lot of extra demands and requirements on us as a commission. We have to have the systems in place and the people there to deal with that."
Tootoo says the commission provides a budget and work plan based on the funds for the year.
"But we also provide them with a needs-based budget - based on our mandate and what we would need to do everything that we're mandated to do. We're not there yet, but (the increase) does help," he said.
