Incumbent MLA, newcomer face off in two-way race in Baker Lake

Baker Lake candidate Karen Kabloona worked most recently as assistant deputy minister of quality of life for Nunavut’s Department of Health, which involved overseeing Nunavut’s suicide prevention strategy. (HANDOUT PHOTO)

Simeon Mikkungwak addresses the legislature in the outgoing government’s final sitting last month. He is running for a second term in Baker Lake. (FILE PHOTO)

First elected as MLA for Baker Lake in 2013, Simeon Mikkungwak hopes to hold onto his job Oct. 30 when Nunavummiut go to the polls.

Over the last four years sitting as a member of the legislative assembly, the bilingual MLA said he’s successfully advocated for a number of initiatives to boost economic development, education, cultural programs and health care services in the Kivalliq community of about 2,000 people.

“I still have some unfinished business,” Mikkungwak told Nunatsiaq News, with a little over a week left to go in this year’s election campaign.

The former community mental health and addictions counsellor had previously served in several elected roles within Baker Lake’s housing authority, hamlet council, hunters and trappers organization and district education authority.

Here are some of the issues Mikkungwak hopes to bring back to the legislature this winter:

• A newly-renovated and fully-staffed health centre: “With [Meadowbank gold mine] operating nearby, we need a larger health centre,” he said. “I want to make sure that continues.”

Work has been done on architectural plans for a future building, he said, but the Government of Nunavut has yet to allocate any funding to the project.

• A second look at the Education Act and a Nunavut University, based in Baker Lake: “The Education Act needs to be more reflective of each community in Nunavut,” he said, “to meet the needs of students who have graduated and who want to go on to college or university.”

Mikkungwak also echoes the call of Baker Lake’s hamlet council, whose mayor has written to the GN to say the community wants to serve as the home of a made-in-Nunavut university.

In 2014, Agnico Eagle Mines Ltd. pledged to contribute $5 million towards a Nunavut university, once the project got GN support. With the proximity of the company’s Meadowbank mine to Baker Lake, Mikkungwak wants to build on their support to help realize the project.

• Airport runway and technology upgrades: Mikkungwak wants to see an expanded runway built so Baker Lake’s airport can serve as more of a hub for the region. Currently, the only passenger aircraft that lands in the community is the Dash-8.

He has also asked to have the airport’s communications technology—or instrument package—updated.

• Renovations to the Martha Taliruq elders centre: Mikkungwak wants to see the local elders’ care facility expanded and its staff trained to deliver higher levels of care.

He said the eight-bed Martha Taliruq centre, run by the community’s hospice society, is often full. And while its staff members oversee the centre’s operations, they are not professional health care providers.

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Karen Kabloona has a number of years of experience working at the legislative assembly, thought not as an elected member. She hopes to change that this year, as the only other candidate running in her hometown of Baker Lake.

Kabloona has a business degree from the University of Calgary and has studied tourism management at Thompson Rivers University.

And she has a lengthy resumé with the GN, most recently as the associate deputy minister for quality of life within the Department of Health, where her role was to oversee the territory’s suicide prevention strategy.

Kabloona has worked for two past Nunavut premiers, Paul Okalik and Eva Aariak.

“From all those experiences, I’m familiar with business planning cycles,” she said. “I have a very in-depth knowledge of those processes. I understand how to get legislation through and how to make sure that community concerns are included.”

Kabloona, who is married with two daughters, is originally from Baker Lake but has lived for many years in Iqaluit. She said the outcome of the election will determine her residency.

Here are some of her priority work areas, if she is elected as MLA:

• Better health care and education, at home: Baker Lake’s health centres close too often. As a long-term fix for that, Kabloona wants to see a university based in the community, which would offer a nursing program.

“We know that health care professionals are more likely to stay where they are trained,” she said. “We need more trained, Inuktitut-speaking nurses here too.”

A Nunavut university should also offer a teaching degree and environmental science program. This would help create jobs in the community and train residents to move into skilled positions, she said—particularly its young population and new high school graduates.

Like her fellow candidate, Kabloona points to Agnico Eagle’s support for such an institution.

• Recreation and community support: For those residents who work at its nearby mine—roughly 300 of them, Kabloona estimates—an equal number of residents are left without a parent, grandparent or sibling over the two-week rotation period.

“That means there could be 150 families who have relatives out of town for two weeks at a time,” Kabloona said.

The community could use a dedicated recreation space and wellness centre, which could offer regular programming for residents of all ages, along with an Inuktitut-language daycare centre. Kabloona says there’s potential for this to be funded through public and private partnerships.

• Stricter protection for caribou: Baker Lake community members should be educated and involved in determining how to manage local caribou populations, Kabloona said.

She points to the GN’s decision last year to support potential development in sensitive caribou areas in the Kivalliq.

“This decision didn’t come to Baker Lake,” she said. “We don’t have the information we need to make good decisions.”

• Equitable funding: For a community its size, located so close to one of Nunavut’s major economic drivers, Kabloona said Baker Lake does a lot with very little.

“We’re good at patching up buildings and programs,” she said. “But there has been a real lack of investment here.”

Kabloona pointed to the GN’s last capital budget of $793 million, less than one per cent of which went to the community.

“That doesn’t allow us to keep up with our growing population,” she said. “I’d work for the people to make sure this community is prioritized.”