Remembering Jim Britton, social worker turned real estate powerhouse

Dennis Patterson

Jim Britton is known in the North as a modest giant of a man with a big but humble heart who had a huge impact in northern Canada.

He died in Calgary on June 19 at the age of 78, leaving behind his wife Jo Anne, who was a teacher for most of their 30 years in Northwest Territories and Nunavut, as well as their son Stuart, his wife Leslie and his granddaughter Maria Fernanda Britton.

Britton began his northern career as a social worker in Hay River, N.W.T., and lived and worked in Fort Smith, N.W.T., Churchill, Man., Iqaluit and Yellowknife. He is remembered in Iqaluit for leading the establishment of Ikajuqtauvik, the North’s first on-the-land correctional program.

He hired highly respected Inuit hunters — role models who restored pride and self-esteem in inmates by linking them to their traditional culture. He plunged into his role as superintendent, making arduous journeys with his Inuit hunter-leaders and inmates to the floe edge or on the land in harsh winter conditions.

He also supported a committee that established Iqaluit’s first community newspaper, Inukshuk, the predecessor of Nunatsiaq News.

Later, in 1975, as regional director for the territorial government, he was instrumental in supporting a grassroots movement to close the liquor store to over-the-counter sales, after a spate of alcohol-related tragedies. The move transformed the community.

Britton became Baffin regional director, then deputy minister of economic development and tourism in Yellowknife. For the 1986 World Exposition in Vancouver, he helped plan the Northwest Territories Pavilion, known for celebrating the fur industry — which was under attack by animal rights activists — and for its muskox burgers.

When he left the territorial government, he and a group of investors started two companies to construct housing and office space throughout the Baffin (now Qiqiktani) Region: Iqaluit House and Grinnell Properties. Inuit investors, under the name Sivuliik Development Corp., subsequently joined the group.

Together, the group focused on creating local employment. It hired inmates from the Baffin Correctional Centre for day jobs, which gave them useful construction skills, work experience and income to support their families.

Eventually the companies merged to become Northern Property Real Estate Investment Trust, which became Canada’s third largest REIT.

Northern Property REIT was a principal builder of the housing required for the new Nunavut territory. Under Britton’s leadership, Northern Property never forgot its origins in the Eastern Arctic. It built on its experience in remote communities and in challenging permafrost conditions to invest in secondary markets outside large urban centres across Canada. It even built two multiplexes in Nuuk, Greenland.

Britton retired from the REIT in 2014 but retained a keen interest in the North. He was active in nurturing his investments in other companies and in his relationships with family and friends.

Although he was known nationally as a successful businessman, it is as a social worker, friend to Inuit, community leader and senior public servant that he is known and fondly remembered in northern Canada.

The Hon. Dennis Patterson represented Nunavut in the Senate from 2008 to 2023. He was premier of Northwest Territories from 1987 to 1991 and played a key role in the Nunavut land claim agreement.