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Wednesday October 21 2015 5 COLUMNS 15 Years Ago... Paulette sharpens his skills One of the hardest-working hockey players to come out of Fort Smith is making a name for himself at the Banff Hockey Academy in Alberta. Geronimo Paulette 18 is doing his Grade 12 at the Academy while he hones his hockey skills seven days a week. Issue October 17 2000 20 Years Ago... Election results on the Internet Elections Canada is going high-tech this year making the 1995 NWT election results available on the Inter- net. Chief Electoral Ofcer Jean-Pierre Kingsley says Elections Canada and the NWT Legislative Assembly will post the results of each northern riding on the In- ternet for one month after the election to help publicize results across the North and the nation. Issue October 17 1995 30 Years Ago... Compulsory education meets opposition The amendment that would put teeth into compulsory school attendance legislation met with some opposition when Education Minister Dennis Patterson met with community leaders in Fort Smith last week. Chief Ray- mond Beaver spoke out against the amendment. Band members who cant afford to keep their kids in school certainly cant afford to pay nes he said. Issue October 17 1985 ARCHIVES Northern Journal 2015 Join us online Like Northern Journal on Facebook and get the weekly news delivered to your feed FACEBOOK FEEDBACK A pair of all candidates meetings a.k.a. debates in Yellowknife gave interested voters in the capital and across the NWT a chance to hear from their federal candidates last week. Yellowknife forums let NWT voters hear directly from MP candidates Ron Gwynne Disgusting Conservatives. Cant even nd their way to a forum but you can be sure they know where to nd their OBSCENE pay cheques each month....150000 a year...over 12000 a month to hide... William Mercredi remembered as a friend athlete 30 people like this. By DAWN KOSTELNIK PierreElliottTrudeauisthe Prime Minister of Canada. He will be doing a tour of the Arctic. The buzz around here is that he may be coming to CoppermineNWTforavisit. Nothing has been conrmed everyoneisinatizzy.Wemust do something special for the Prime Minister of Canada. Whatdoyouthinkthatpeople fromtheOutsidewanttosee when they travel to the East- ern Arctic Why polar bears of course. They are known White Girl Nanurluk super bear as Nanook in this area that is what they are called in the language of the Inuit. We have no polar bears at least not on a regular basis likeChurchillManitoba.They can conjure up the big Spirit Bears on demand there. How cananyonecompetewiththat Truth be told we are really happy not to have the giant white bears hanging around waiting to eat us or the dogs. I cant imagine bumping into one in a white out it would be a big bump with bad con- sequences. Biting dogs are enough to deal with. A few years ago a hunter travelled out on the sea ice to hunt seals. His family waited forhimtocomehomeastorm blew in and he is late. Being a few days late after a storm is usualheisstillnothomeafter aweek. Itistime. Hisfriends andhissongatherandforma search party to look for him. Hehasbeenoutontheseaice alonefartoolong. Theytravel fortwodaysthehuntingisnot good thisyearthehunterhas to go far-r-r away to look for seals. Nothing nothing he goesway-y-youtder. Alittle black dot on the frozen white ocean is all he is. Looklook Anarmpoints outdirectionjerkingbackand forth in excitement there Anoverloadedkomatikgrows largeinsizeastheyapproach the skidoo is still attached to the sled. Peter T. Peter T. where are you There is no answer in the still and empty spacenotevenanechothere isnothingforavoicetobounce offof. Voicescarryonandes- capeovertheiceandsnowand dropdownintoRussiatovisit. Twoskidooswiththreemen have travelled long to find their friend and father. Both skidoos sit beside the heavy komatik. Wind has drifted snow up against the sled rails and along the sides of the de- serted skidoo they have not moved for a long time. There arenotracksinthesnow.Days backthefrozenbrushofwind andweathererasedanytracks ofman.Itisgettingdarkthey needtomakecampbeforenight dropshardontopofthemwith its solid heavy black. To be continued. www.thewhitegirl.ca By MIKE BRADSHAW Executive director NWT Chamber of Commerce TheDepartmentofEnviron- ment and Natural Resources has hit a new low in strategic thinking with its Draft Con- servationActionPlan.ENRis proposing that as much as 40 percentoflandintheterritory be set aside for conservation. BycomparisonCanadascom- mitmentinternationallyisfor 17percentofthenationalland masstobedesignatedascon- servation areas. What are they thinking askedKevinDieboldPresident oftheNWTChamberofCom- merce. At a time when were struggling to attract resource investmentweresendingpre- cisely the wrong signals. NWT has a questionable reputation already which is why exploration investment has continued to fall over the past seven years from a high of 200 million in 2007 to a projectedlowoflessthan44 million in 2015. Sustaining and growing mining requires healthy exploration. For the most part exploring for and nding a mine is like looking for a needle in a hay stack. The Holy Grail for explo- ration is land access and as soon as you start to tinker with access you run the risk of ruining what credibility we may still have. One depart- mentsayswereopenforbusi- ness and ENR slams the door shut said Diebold. Besides weve already got one-third of the territory on lock down. According to the Mining Recorders Ofce 32 percent of the NWT is off limits to staking and exploration.That gureincludeslandforparks interimlandclaimwithdraw- als and protected areas. Once land claims are settled and land claim withdrawals are removed the Conservation Action Plan would be looking for additional areas to alien- ate from development. Putting a fence up around morelandisaseriousimpedi- ment and mining investors around the world are already staying away from the NWT in droves said Diebold. Annually the Fraser Insti- tutesurveysglobalminingex- ecutives to produce an over- all Investment Attractiveness Index based not only on a re- gions geological attractive- ness but on regulatory and policy factors which affect investment Policy Percep- tion Index or PPI. While the NWT continu- ously ranks high in its geo- logical potential it continues to lose in attractiveness be- cause of such factors as oner- ous regulations unsettled land claims and uncertainty over land access. The 2014 survey ranked Ireland as the top-rated juris- diction for policy factors with a score of 96.0. Finland and Alberta follow closely both 94.7 tied at second. In total ve Canadian ju- risdictions nished with top 10 PPI ratings world-wide. The NWT had a PPI rat- ing of 63.96 the lowest in the country. Even countries like Botswana and Namibia nishedhigherthantheNWT in PPI rankings. Investment goes where it cangrow.Itgoeswhereinves- tors sense policy certainty. This latest announcement does exactly the opposite it creates another layer of uncertainty said Diebold. The NWT is at a cross- roads. We have serious is- sues and we need serious minded people to resolve them he said. In a recent Business Issues andPrioritiessurveyconducted bytheNWTChamberofCom- mercerespondentswereasked about their condence in the economy. Over the next 12 months 65.3 percent feel the economywilldeclinewhileonly 3 percent feel it will improve. Over the next 36 months 52.8 percent feel it will continue to declineandonly21percentfeel it will improve. These are telling results. Without business condence and investment who will pro- vide jobs How will govern- ments raise more tax revenue to pay for new water treat- ment plants health care or municipal and territorial in- frastructure asks Diebold. Were already dead last in the country as a resource in- vestment destination. When are we going to end the ab- surdity of shutting out in- vestment and begin building some prosperity Draft conservation action plan absurd