The City’s Municipal Services Committee will come head-to-head next week with a time-honoured practice that’s guided development in Yellowknife since its earliest days, when miners burned the camps of absent Dene and claimed ownership of the land. Politely described as the appropriation of public land for private use, it’s more commonly known as squatting. Evidence
The old caution that those who ignore history are doomed to repeat it found confirmation in the latest report on Yellowknife’s Municipal Enforcement Division. “We were told 20 years ago to do many of the same things we’re being told to do today,” Councillor Adrian Bell wrote in an email to EDGEYK.com. Bell noted the
Even with a report outlining arsenic hotspots around the route planned for the Giant Mine bypass road, the Department of Transportation didn’t conduct baseline testing before construction began, according to Range Lake MLA Daryl Dolynny. On Friday, Dolynny discussed two documents tabled the previous day which provide, he claims, “clear evidence that the DOT failed
Even with large jumps in the price of energy, Yellowknife’s overall Consumer Price Index increase of 1.8 per cent was slightly less than the Canadian average, according to data released Friday by Statistics Canada. The energy category increased by 5.3 per cent (see graph below) with larger spikes in electricity (7.9 per cent) and fuel and
As the Yellowknife Rec Hockey league gets underway, here’s a memory from the Gerry Murphy days. Hutch ran the “Murphdome” for years and was well known to anyone who skated in Yellowknife. The arena was demolished in 2004 after 54 years of use.
A major overhaul of child services in the NWT was tabled by Minister of Health and Social Services minister Glen Abernethy. The “Building Stronger Families: An Action Plan to Transform Child and Family Services” outlines a number of initiatives to remedy a system found woefully inadequate by the Auditor General and the standing committee on
The first take away from the 50-page draft report on the Municipal Enforcement Division released on Wednesday is that the authors don’t get down to the short strokes until the final few pages. For those without the patience to read through it, the report by Vancouver-based consultants Perivale and Taylor answers within the first few
It’s capital budget season, so the big-ticket items will be about major infrastructure investments like Stanton Territorial Hospital or the Mackenzie Valley Fibre Link. We can also expect, however, a range of other issues to be brought to the house. I chatted with several Yellowknife MLAs to get a sense of what’s on their agenda
Heritage Committee Chair and NWT Mining Heritage Society Vice-President Mike Vaydik hopes Yellowknifers will donate to a campaign to save the headframe. photos Angela Gzowski A new plan to save the Robertson Headframe, through a mix of private donations and City funding, got its first airing at Wednesday’s heritage committee meeting. The idea is to have
More assessments, fewer tax hikes, council hopes Eager to dodge future tax shocks like the one still rocking Kam Lake, city council voted unanimously on Monday to change the frequency of general property assessments to once every five years. In the past, general assessments – which gauge property values for the purpose of taxation –
I didn’t consider this hard-hitting enough documentary journalism to get up close and photograph people’s various positions, but this gives an idea of the space. Usually when facing an over-night itinerary, I’d book a hotel near the airport. But I hadn’t thought ahead and was facing a 6 a.m. departure, which hardly made the effort
On EDGE: Opinion Last week’s RCMP naming of a violent pedophilic sex offender being released into our community brought an unsurprising mix of aggressive social media messages pitted against those concerned with the loss of that person’s privacy. But what really struck me was normally level-headed people who, based on this announcement, weren’t going to
“Feel my rage rush through my blood, lost from knowledge lost from love,” Leela Gilday sings on “Cut My Hair,” off her newest album There’s a snarl in her voice and fire in her belly. “Lost, stolen, ripped, torn, beaten, raped, tossed, worn,” she intones over the guttural chants of Polaris-winning throat singer Tanya Tagaq. Now
The Northern Breed Motorcycle Club of Yellowknife held a huge parade from Yellowknife’s Old Town out to the sandpits to kick off their weekend long celebration. A City by-law car led the way, followed closely by Bob Carpenter, Ted Kidston, Jim O’Neil and the rest of the crew.
On EDGE: Opinion No matter what, you have to give Premier Bob McLeod his due. The man’s willing to hustle. There he was in Washington D.C. late last month, representing straight from X1A, pitching the Northwest Territories as the emergency escape hatch for Alberta bitumen, which is finding it harder and harder to get out