Iqaluit city council is considering a new bylaw that would add support for local businesses to the criteria the municipality considers in its purchasing process.

At their meeting Tuesday night, city councillors looked over the draft of a procurement bylaw which, if approved, would repeal and replace the current bylaw which has been in place since 2023.

The city wants to move away from simply showing preference to the lowest–priced bids when it purchases goods or services, finance director Peter Tumilty told councillors.

“The ‘best value’ was a concept trying to incorporate quality experience and not necessarily just the lowest price, because you may not always get the best results,” Tumilty said in response to a question from Coun. Sam Tilley.

Tilley noted some projects might benefit from a more experienced contractor and that “low cost isn’t necessarily in the city’s best interest.”

The current bylaw includes a brief description of “best value” as “the optimal balance of high quality and financial terms.”

The draft bylaw councillors reviewed Tuesday expands on that term.

It states that “best value” means the “purchase represents the greatest overall benefit to the City of Iqaluit by considering the most advantageous combination of price, quality, and support for local and Inuit businesses — not solely determined by the lowest price but by evaluating multiple factors.”

The draft bylaw also says “preference will be given to local suppliers throughout all aspects of procurement process within the city.”

Local suppliers are defined as people with Iqaluit business licences and who operate within the city’s boundaries.

Tilley asked several questions Tuesday, clarifying details such as how the bylaw reflects territorial law. He suggested a few changes as well as including a dispute-resolution process.

Councillors deferred approval of the bylaw on second reading so that changes can be made.

Tilley, who drew on his experience working in procurement with the Government of Nunavut, told reporters after the meeting that he likes what he saw in the bylaw but that it needs some edits.

“A few definitions in the bylaw just need to be tweaked a bit,” he said.

“Other than that, it’s a great bylaw.”

Even with the extension of Inuit Child First Initiative funding, there is still uncertainty around the future of programs that depend on it.

“There were tears amongst health-care providers when they heard about the end of this program,” said Dr. Sindu Govindapillai, director of Qupanuaq, which uses the Inuit Child First Initiative money to fund local programs in Nunavut’s Qikiqtaaluk Region.

She indicated that its food voucher program, which provides a $500 food voucher per child under 18 to Inuit families and an additional $250 for any child under age four, has been especially impactful.

“We heard from some child protection workers that up to 90 per cent of their calls before the hamlet food voucher program were for food,” Govindapillai said.

The Inuit Child First Initiative is a funding program that runs in parallel to the Jordan’s Principle program. It funds health, education and social programs for Inuit children and youth. All funding related to Inuit Child First expires March 31.

The future of Inuit Child First Initiative was in limbo until earlier this month when Crown-Indigenous Relations Minister Gary Anandasangaree announced a one-year extension of the program.

Anandasangaree stressed during his announcement that the extension still needs parliamentary approval, however.

With a snap federal election called, that approval, if it happens at all, will come sometime after the election slated for April 28.

Over the past five years, the federal government has spent $367.5 million on the Inuit Child First Initiative. Indigenous Services Minister Patty Hajdu said on March 21 that $121.7 million would be allocated for a 2025-26 one time extension, pending approval.

With an extension will come new guidelines and restrictions. Previously, a hamlet could register all of its children and youths as a group to be eligible. New restrictions require each child to be individually registered.

For Igloolik, that means staff are scrambling to register 1,008 children, said Carolyn Tapardjuk, food security co-ordinator with the Hamlet of Igloolik.

Even if the new requirements are met, the future of the food voucher program specifically is not certain.

Funding to continue the program has not been announced, even though Govindapillai said she has asked several times for clarification.

“The best-case scenario we’re looking at [is] there’s a delay. So the program stops for however long, until the government makes a decision to look at these and to approve them, and then the worst-case scenario is that they’re all ending,” Govindapillai said.

“But there’s no scenario I can see where on April 1 all the hamlet food voucher programs continue seamlessly.”

Nunatsiaq News requested an interview with a representative for Indigenous Services Canada, but that request was declined.

“We are not able to confirm when parliamentary approval will be obtained for the renewed funding for the Inuit Child First Initiative,” Carolane Gratton, spokesperson for Indigenous Services Canada, said in email on Wednesday.

While many celebrated the federal government's renewal of the Inuit Child First Initiative, some still worry that a vital program for kids in Nunavut is at risk of shutting down. 

A 17-year-old boy reported missing in Iqaluit on Tuesday by his family has been found safe.

RCMP confirmed the update Thursday morning in an email to Nunatsiaq News.

Iqaluit Coun. Simon Nattaq included a clear message in a meandering speech to RCMP Tuesday evening: I can get you fired.

“I have numbers in my pocket,” Nattaq said in Inuktitut through an interpreter during Tuesday night’s council meeting.

“I will be able to report certain RCMP members that are not serving like I expect and they can be removed.”

Nattaq offered the warning as part of a lengthy comment after RCMP updated council on crime and police activity statistics for the months of January and February in Iqaluit.

Nattaq did not provide names in his account of an interaction with police he said happened when he called them to his house. The incident was “not recent,” he said.

“I was asked, ‘Do you want to leave?’” Nattaq said. “That’s what I was told, even though I called for another person to be held. They asked if I wanted to leave the community. I don’t want to hear that again.”

Sgt. Zhivka Ivanova offered Nattaq an apology for his experience and told him that every officer in Iqaluit is there to serve and protect.

She told Nattaq she couldn’t comment on his experience because she didn’t have the details.

“But I can tell you there are processes for that if you wish to come in and discuss further,” she said. “My door for sure is always open.”

People can file official complaints about RCMP through the police public complaints process. Nunavut RCMP’s handling of complaints has recently come under fire.

The Civilian Review and Complaints Commission released a report in November describing years-long backlogs of complaints and a higher than average rate of withdrawn complaints.

The report recommended Nunavut RCMP take into account the territory’s unique circumstances and hire a special constable to review complaints.

It also noted the number of complaints — 75 over four years between 2018 and 2022 — was lower than the national average, which may be attributed to a lack of trust and lack of awareness of the public complaints system.

At the time, RCMP spokesperson Cpl. George Henrie said the RCMP had made several improvements to the system, including hiring a dedicated employee to investigate complaints.

Henrie did not respond immediately on Wednesday when asked whether that role is still filled and what other improvements may have been made since then.

Nunatsiaq News was unable to reach Nattaq via phone or email for further comment.

People can make complaints against the RCMP online, through the mail, or via fax through the Civilian Review and Complaints Commission or by contacting Nunavut RCMP directly.

"We all need to do better." Dozens of caribou have been wasted this winter road season. The killing of pregnant cows, vital to herd strength, is also a concern.

The NWT is recording fewer births and more deaths. It's losing hundreds of people a year to the south. These charts show how immigration changes that picture.

Some of the NWT's top young speed skaters are heading to Canada's youth championships. We sent a reporter to train with them.

Two Yellowknife daycares are launching a fundraising effort that involves adult artists finishing paintings started by children. One key ingredient is needed.

National Inuit women's non-profit Pauktuutit announced Nikki Komaksiutiksak as its new president and chief executive officer.

Saelym DeGrandpré, a 23-year-old woman living in Ottawa, carves makeup brushes out of antlers. She says it's a way to connect with her culture and her ancestors.

Donovan McNeely, 26, pleaded guilty to uttering threats and breaching a no-contact order in N.W.T. Territorial Court on Wednesday.

The NDP party announced on Wednesday that Katherine McCallum will run for Yukon MP in the upcoming federal election set for April 28.

A federal judge in Alaska on Tuesday ruled the Biden administration lacked the authority to cancel seven oil and gas leases that had been issued for the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge.

The Yukon NDP says public money has been going to religious instruction in the territory’s Catholic schools, contrary to the terms of a 1962 agreement between the Yukon government and Catholic diocese.

Tim Whiskeychan, a Cree contemporary artist from Waskaganish, flew to Paris this month to teach Cree culture through art with French students.

This year’s Terence Tootoo Memorial hockey tournament was “99 per cent” successful.

That’s according to event co-chair Troy Aksalnik, in a phone interview Wednesday with Nunatsiaq News.

The remaining one per cent involved a heated exchange of words that erupted as Team North and Team Tootoo players shook hands following the A division championship final, which Team Tootoo won 6-4.

Referees ordered two Team North players off the ice following the post-game incident.

The tournament held annually in Rankin Inlet is named to honour the older brother of Jordin Tootoo, the first Inuk to play in the National Hockey League. Terence Tootoo, a Rankin Inlet hockey player, died by suicide in 2022.

This year’s games ran from March 12 to 16.

“There were remarks made that were completely inappropriate,” said Jordin Tootoo, addressing the packed arena before honouring players from both teams after the championship game. Video of the game is available on YouTube.

“We take this very seriously. We have to be united — watch out for each other. That’s what community does. That’s what my brother, Terence, would want — not all the B.S. behind the scenes.”

Meanwhile, Rankin Inlet won the B division championship game 5-1 against last year’s winning team, the North Baffin Eskimos, earlier in the evening on March 16.

Thirteen teams from around Nunavut competed in 28 games during this year’s tournament.

“There will be changes made in coming weeks,” Aksalnik said, to avoid a repeat of the incident that marred the final moments of this year’s tournament.

The event ended on a positive note, with Tootoo thanking Aksalnik and all the volunteers, players and fans who otherwise made the event a success.

“I think we can all agree we had a great weekend,” said Tootoo.

Two Yellowknife students were selected as Loran Scholars, a designation billed as being worth more than $100,000 in various forms of support over four years.

A body of a man was found Wednesday morning on the ice where Puvirnituq’s snow festival is taking place, with police saying all possibilities are at play.

Police tape was set up at the exact spot where some 200 sculptors and community members gathered Monday for the start of the five-day Puvirnituq Snow Festival.

The body found was that of a man in his 40s, said Nunavik Police Service deputy Chief Jean-François Morin.

Police were called to the scene at around 6 a.m.

“All hypotheses are being studied at the moment,” said Morin in a French email.

Nunavik police have called upon the Sureté du Québec’s crimes against the person division, which is on its way to Puvirnituq.

The death was reported at the Inuulitsivik Health Centre, said Sureté du Québec spokesperson Hugues Beaulieu.

He said circumstances of the event are still “nebulous,” which is why the investigation division was called in. A coroner has also been assigned to the case.

Beaulieu said he wouldn’t share any further details.

Dogsled racing and igloo building activities scheduled for the snow festival on Wednesday have been cancelled, but the events planned for the evening inside Satuumavik gymnasium will go on as scheduled.

Outdoor activities are expected to resume Thursday.

Nunavut Sen. Nancy Karetak-Lindell has joined the Independent Senators Group, a move she says aligns with her approach to parliamentary work and representation for the North.

Formed in 2016, it’s the largest group in the Senate and operates independently of political parties. Karetak-Lindell’s joining brings the total number of group members to 42.

In total, there are 105 representatives in the Senate.

“I feel this is the group that has the same philosophy as mine,” Karetak-Lindell said Tuesday in a news release issued by the senators’ group. “Being the only senator for a given northern territory, you count on colleagues to support you in having your voice heard.”

Karetak-Lindell, who is from Arviat, was appointed to the Senate on Dec. 19, succeeding former senator Dennis Patterson who retired in December 2023.  She previously made history in 1997 as a Liberal MP — the first female MP for the Eastern Arctic, and the first representative for the new Nunavut riding.

Due to the prorogation of Parliament in January and its subsequent dissolution for the April 28 federal election, Karetak-Lindell has yet to be officially sworn into office.

The NWT government confirmed the means it will use to end the territory's customized carbon tax and set out the consequences residents can expect.

Iqaluit Coun. Sam Tilley says he is healed and more motivated than ever to serve the community following his return from treatment for alcohol use.

Tilley made his return to city council Tuesday night after taking part in a two-month program in British Columbia.

“I speak to you today not just as a councillor, but as a person who has faced struggle, stood at a crossroads and made the choice to fight for my future,” Tilley said in a statement to councillors.

He described the past few months as “deeply personal” and “transformative,” as he has worked to address his addictions, trauma and mental health issues.

“By acknowledging and treating these struggles, I gained an understanding of resilience, compassion, and strength — qualities I believe are essential in serving our community,” he said.

Tilley used his statement to speak to others in Iqaluit who might be struggling with mental health and addiction. His message is: you are not alone.

“I stand as proof that change is possible, healing is possible, strength is possible, and if my journey can inspire even one person to take that first step to reach out, to believe that there is hope, then every struggle has been worth it,” he said.

“Let us come together as a community, remove stigmas, support one another, and build a healthier, more compassionate city for everyone.”

Tilley’s statement was met with applause.

Councillors Simon Nattaq and Amber Aglukark followed with statements of their own praising Tilley for his recovery.

“As an Inuk man, your journey is not just personal, it’s powerful and inspiring for everyone who is watching,” Aglukark said, mentioning that she has known Tilley since they grew up together in Arviat.

“You’ve demonstrated that true healing is possible, and in doing so, you are leading by example.”

Mayor Solomon Awa also praised Tilley for his progress.

“The things that we go through cannot change unless we rise up and change them,” he said.

Tilley, who is in his second term on council, spoke with reporters after the meeting. He described the program he attended as three years’ worth of treatment done over nine weeks.

He spoke of being surrounded by the tall trees of Vancouver Island, and the “healing” opportunity when he was given a blanket in a ceremony led by members of the Saanich First Nations.

He said he has a “clear mindset” and a positive outlook on the future as he remains committed to serving on city council.

“The people that voted for me — and not just who voted for me, but the people of Iqaluit — need to know these kinds of things,” Tilley said when asked about going public about his treatment.

“I felt obligated to do it for them. Not just for them, but for myself.”

Police are asking for help locating Zachary Nuyalia, a 17-year-old reported missing Tuesday in Iqaluit.

Nuyalia was last seen in the Tundra Valley area between 5 p.m. and 6 p.m. Monday, and his family reported him missing on Tuesday, RCMP said Tuesday evening in a news release.

They describe Nuyalia as 5-foot-8 and 115 pounds with long, below shoulder-length black hair, brown eyes, and a slim build. He may have a moustache.

He was last seen wearing a black hoodie, blue puffer jacket with a hood, dark-coloured pants, a black and yellow backpack with the number “66” on the front of it, blue hearing aids, and glasses.

Anyone with information is asked to contact the Iqaluit RCMP at 867-979-1111.

The Yukon government is amending its fishing regulations for Little Atlin Lake to protect its lake trout population. 

Yellowknife's mayor choosing to become a candidate in the federal election has some knock-on effects at City Hall. This is how municipal politics is affected.

Yukon Party Leader Currie Dixon largely sidestepped an opportunity to defend his health critic on Thursday after the premier launched an attack on Brad Cathers’s record leading the file.

Quiz time! Let’s see who has been paying attention to the news this week.

1. Health Minister John Main says he’s frustrated by the federal government’s “delay tactics and for the refusal to come to the negotiating table” to reach a new funding agreement for the Non-Insured Health Benefits program that pays some expenses, including medical travel for Nunavummiut. What does he suggest he might have to do?

A. Get Nunavut to fund the program itself.
B. Start sending patients to U.S. hospitals and send the bills to Ottawa.
C. Hand the program back to the federal government to run.

2. When Prime Minister Mark Carney visited Iqaluit on Tuesday, Nunavut Premier P.J. Akeeagok greeted him by saying “welcome home.” Where was Carney born?

A. Yukon
B. Northwest Territories
C. Alberta

3. Parents and students might notice a change when they return to school in Nunavut in the fall. What’s happening in the schools?

A. Inuit language education will become available for students in kindergarten through Grade 12.
B. A new curriculum will be rolled out for kindergarten and Grade 1.
C. School days will start and end one hour later, to accommodate bus schedules.

4. A landmark court ruling means Nunavut will get a share of a $32.5-billion settlement. What was the lawsuit all about?

A. Getting large tobacco companies to pay up for harms caused by smoking.
B. Suing pharmaceutical companies over harms from opioid-related deaths.
C. Seeking damages from beer and alcohol producers over the effects of alcoholism.

5. It was a whirlwind first week in office for Carney — he was sworn in as prime minister and named his new cabinet on March 14, then jetted off to England and France and made it back to Iqaluit by March 18. Who is the Crown-Indigenous relations and northern affairs minister in Carney’s new cabinet?

A. Patty Hajdu
B. Jenna Sudds
C. Gary Anandasangaree

Kugluktuk’s elementary school is seen in this file photo. A change is coming starting this fall for some students at Nunavut schools. (File photo by Dustin Patar)

Answers

1. C — Main, who is Nunavut’s health minister, says the Government of Nunavut might hand the program back to the feds if the current funding agreement isn’t renewed after March 31.
2. B — Carney was born in Fort Smith, N.W.T., and was raised in Alberta. Akeeagok said he welcomed the new prime minister as a “fellow northerner” during Monday’s visit.
3. B — It’s a new curriculum. Education Minister Pamela Gross called it “an important milestone” for the elementary education system, and it’s expected to be expanded all the way to Grade 12 by 2036.
4. A — It’s the tobacco producers that were targeted by the provinces and territories in the lawsuit. Nunavut will receive $97 million from the $32.5-billion settlement.
5. C — Gary Anandasangaree returns as minister for northern affairs and Crown-Indigenous relations.

Canadians are gradually waking up to the importance of Arctic security and sovereignty, but the country’s political leaders still seem a bit groggy.

Three federal party leaders have come to Iqaluit since Feb. 10 to spell out their plans to protect Arctic security and sovereignty. But their plans still need some work before they’re fully formed.

The uncertain world we live in has pushed Canada’s Arctic to the top of the political agenda. An aggressive Russia, an influence-seeking China, and an unpredictable United States are forcing Canadian politicians to tackle Arctic issues head on.

The Macdonald-Laurier Institute think tank in Ottawa cautioned this week that Canada is “sleepwalking into Arctic irrelevance.”

In a commentary, researcher Alexander Dalziel called it “urgent” for Canadian leaders to “think Arctic” when developing defence and foreign policies.

“It is urgent because, to keep it stable and peaceful, status quo actions no longer are enough,” Dalziel wrote.

Ignoring the Arctic increases the likelihood of Canada’s adversaries attempting “destabilizing actions” there, he added.

You don’t need a crystal ball to see that the Arctic will play a big role in the 2025 federal election — whether that’s in the spring or in October.

Prime Minister Mark Carney ­— on the fifth day in his new job — popped into Iqaluit on Tuesday to spell out the Liberal government’s plan for the Arctic.

Amid the unravelling of the traditional Canada-U.S. relationship and the need to shore up ties with historical allies the United Kingdom and France, Carney made it a priority to signal where he stands on the Arctic. It includes an operational support hub in Nunavut and hundreds of millions of dollars to beef up a military presence in the North.

Six weeks ago, Conservative Leader Pierre Poilievre was in Nunavut, promising to build a full-fledged military base in Iqaluit — Canadian Forces Base Iqaluit — if his party forms the government.

That base would be operational within two years of the Conservatives coming to power, he said. That seems like an ambitious target, considering sealift and construction season limitations in the North, as well as the demand for construction workers everywhere.

NDP Leader Jagmeet Singh was in Iqaluit last weekend with his vision for defending Canada’s interests in the Arctic.

Singh cited the “dangerous times” we live in as the need to establish a military base in Iqaluit. Even the NDP — historically rooted in pacifism — promises to meet Canada’s NATO commitment of spending two per cent of its GDP defence … by 2032.

This sudden attention on defence risks overshadowing the ongoing challenges northerners deal with, including housing and the affordability of food. Not only do leaders need to “think Arctic” in terms of defence and foreign policies, they must not forget to “think Arctic” when it comes to domestic social and economic policies.

With an election call likely within days, Nunatsiaq News pledges to “think Arctic” in its coverage and give sovereignty and security the attention it deserves — and is demanding — during the campaign.

The federal Green Party says its deputy leader – Angela Davidson, known as Rainbow Eyes – will be the party's NWT candidate in the coming federal election.

Folk on the Rocks star, Toronto artist and Cabin Radio playlist stalwart Skye Wallace played an acoustic set on Mornings at the Cabin. Listen here.

Robert Peary was America’s most famous Arctic explorer.

He had a wife and two children in the U.S., but he also had two children in northern Greenland with a woman of the Inughuit named Aleqasina. She was in fact the wife of one of the ablest guides and hunters in the district, Piugaattuq.

Peary’s affair with Aleqasina probably began in 1896 when she was about 15 years old. She may have been married to Piugaattuq by that time, as it was customary for women to marry quite young, perhaps because there was a scarcity of women in the region.

By 1913, according to the diary of another explorer in the district, Aleqasina had four children – two girls fathered by Piugaattuq, and two boys, Saamik and Kaali, fathered by Robert Peary.

Piugaatuq apparently did not discourage his wife’s relationship with Peary, for whom he worked for much of the time. The explorer provided Piugaattuq with generous payment for his services: guns, ammunition, food and clothing, far in excess of what he paid the other hunters.

But that apparently was not enough for Peary. If Aleqasina was not available, someone else would suffice. Peary moved the Inughuit around northwestern Greenland and even Ellesmere Island like so many chattels. Sometimes whole families were moved, other times parts of families. 

Jerome Allen kept a private diary while on the Crocker Land Expedition, an expedition led by Peary’s young acolyte Donald Macmillan, after Peary had left the district for good.

Allen wrote in 1914, “Ahnadooah [probably Arnaluaq], Kudlukto’s wife, who is about 19 … has a baby which is a spoiled child. She was Peary’s wife pro-tem on his last trip [1908-1909], when she was but 14.”

Fourteen years old! Robert Peary was 52 at the time! 

This liaison was not a secret. Dr. Harrison Hunt, on the same expedition, wrote, “When Peary was last north, he took a younger woman on his trip, but when he returned he went off in the hills with his former wife [Aleqasina], and the result was the second son [Kaali].”

Hunt is correct on all except the date of the second son’s birth, for Kaali Peary’s birthdate is recorded as June 6, 1906. 

And there is other evidence.

Peary’s great rival as a polar explorer, Dr. Frederick Cook, was at Etah, a staging point for exploration in northern Greenland, in 1909 on his own alleged return from the North Pole. He questioned the Inughuit about what Peary had done there the previous year on his way farther north. 

In his notes, Cook wrote: “The Roosevelt [Peary’s ship] went northward with two young girls for P. cabin. Annodou and Evllie, both 13 years old, crying bitterly, were taken from their mothers and families, forced on the ship and taken north for the lust of him who seeks the pole … Illegitimate children are scattered among the tribe … and at least two should bear the name of Peary … Seeking to avoid a more liberal distribution of Peary offspring has thus taken two young girls of 13.”

The first girl mentioned, Annodou, is certainly the girl mentioned in Jerome Allen’s diary as Ahnadooah. But Cook claims she was even a year younger – only 13. 

And he suggests that Peary, concerned about creating even more offspring in the district, was purposely taking girls so young that they were unlikely to become pregnant!

Back in the U.S., later in 1909 and aware that the Brooklyn Institute of Arts and Sciences, one of Peary’s many patrons, was about to honour Peary, Cook wrote to Dr. Franklin Hooper, director of that institution, to call Peary out for his wrong-doings and argue for “cleanliness in public life.”

“You are about to honour Peary,” he wrote.

“You invite our wives and daughters to come and do honor to a man under a cloud of indecency. We have a right to expect that the Brooklyn Institute, in its efforts to uplift man by the high aim of arts and science, gives us clean words from clean lips.

“Peary has used the most sacred of our institutions, the public schools, to gather subscriptions for this pretended effort of getting to the pole,” he went on.

“Part of this money thus taken from the hands of our innocent school children was used to promote an immorality that would put the White Slave Trade to shame. Can you put the veil of innocence on this?

“Later the ship Roosevelt was used as a harem. This ship was flying the American flag, was engaged in a mission for which the government was responsible, was equipped at public expense. Its leader drawing an unearned pay as a naval officer. I charge that this ship was used as a den to satisfy a craving which leads to moral rottenness.

“Here Americans are put to the shame of seeing the stars and stripes floating over an Arctic Hell. And, under the cover of wild people, beyond the reach of medical help, the flames of unmentionable diseases – diseases now sapping the life blood of the world’s last clean aborigines. Will you have our wives and daughters shake this man’s unclean hands?”

Cook’s protests were to no avail, and the planned honouring of Peary proceeded.

“Pedophile” was a word not used much in the early 1900s, but it seems an apt modern word to describe Peary’s actions at the time.

You be the judge: Was Robert Peary a pedophile?

Taissumani is an occasional column that recalls events of historical interest. Kenn Harper is a historian and writer who lived in the Arctic for over 50 years. He is the author of Give Me Winter, Give Me Dogs: Knud Rasmussen and the Fifth Thule Expedition, and Thou Shalt Do No Murder, among other books. Feedback? Send your comments and questions to [email protected].

There are 59 teams in this weekend's tournament in Whitehorse. And for the first time, some of the games will be streamed live online.