New Nunavut national park now in final stages: park planner

This map from Parks Canada shows the boundaries of new national park being proposed for Nunavut: the Qausuittuq National Park in the High Arctic. The purple shows the proposed park boundaries, the beige Inuit-owned lands and the green Polar Bear Pass National Wildlife Area. The proposed park borders, intended to protect habitat for the endangered Peary caribou, skirt the oil-rich Bent Horn oil field on Cameron Island where an oil well produced oil until 1996.

The proposed Bathurst Island national park, which has been in the works for nearly two decades, could become reality in a matter of months.

“I’d say it will happen before the summer season,” said David Murray, Parks Canada’s senior planner of new northern parks, at a Nov. 27 presentation in Iqaluit.

In October, Parks Canada officially withdrew the lands that will become Qausuittuq National Park, Nunavut’s fifth national park.

The area includes most of Bathurst Island in Nunavut’s High Arctic, an island noted for its population of endangered Peary caribou as well as its potential for mineral, oil and gas development.

At just under 20,000 square kilometres, Qausuittuq will be the ninth largest national park in Canada.

“But there’s a lot of little potential glitches” the park moves into in the final park creation process, Murrary said.

“And whenever a potential glitch turns into a big glitch, it adds three months. I’ve learned with other parks, it’s always the things that you can’t predict. Things happen, there’s surprises,” he said.

An Inuit Impact Benefit Agreement is now in its “last stages,” he said.

After the IIBA is signed between the Qikiqtani Inuit Association and Parks Canada, that’s when the area set aside for the new park will fall under Parks Canada management.

The IIBA establishes a joint park management committee and creates “processes to ensure that there will be economic opportunities for Inuit, especially in Resolute,” Murray said.

The cost of the park? That’s could reach more than $20 million over a seven-year period, the period covered by the IIBA.

The money will pay for the construction of a visitor’s centre and park office, travel and staff salaries.

Most of the park’s future employees will come from Resolute Bay, about 150 to 200 kilometres from the park.

“We’re expecting 10-ish [employees]. But more than half of those are seasonal,” Murray said, adding that “the majority of all Parks Canada positions in Resolute will go to qualified Inuit.”

The QIA will also have input on the hiring process, he said.

Training and scholarships are also part of opportunities that the park will offer.

But before the IIBA can be signed off by the QIA, there are a few other steps left in the process.

These include information sessions in Resolute, scheduled for Nov. 29, and talks with the territorial and federal governments to take place next week.

Then, Parks Canada must finalize its submission to the Nunavut Impact Review Board for approval.

“I can’t predict what the board will say or what other information the board will need,” Murray said.

And, if there is a snag at the NIRB stage, that could add more months to the finalizing of the park.

When the legal description of the park is tabled and passed in Parliament, Qausuittuq will then be included in the Canadian National Parks Act.

That could take up to a year, Murray said.