Nunavik health board executive director, president face “corrective action”

This file photo shows Robert Salois, Quebec’s health and welfare commissioner, meeting with Jeannie May, the executive director of Nunavik’s regional board of health and social services, and Alasie Arngak, its president, in 2007 to tell them about the province’s new forum for health and welfare issues. (FILE PHOTO)

The executive director of the Nunavik Regional Health and Social Services Board, Jeannie May, and Alasie Arngak, the president of the health board, may face disciplinary action, sources have told Nunatsiaq News.

That’s after evidence of credit card misuse came to light during a review of the health board’s finances.

Members of the health board then decided Dec. 6 to have an independent third party examine the review’s findings.

The health board’s assistant executive director, Gilles Boulet, and its communication officer did not wish to comment early on Dec. 8.

But the regional health board issued a statement in the afternoon of Dec. 8.

“At the 76th session of the board of directors held in Kuujjuaq on December 6, 2011, a letter of recommendation prepared by the firm Raymond Chabot Grant Thornton was tabled,” the statement reads.

“The Nunavik Regional Board of Health and Social Services (NRBHSS) wishes to point out that everything will be done to ensure compliance and application of the recommendations. In response to a reference in the letter concerning the inappropriate use of credit cards, the board of directors will ask an independent third party to review the situation in order to ensure that, if necessary, corrective action is taken.

“No interview will be granted.”