Nunavut MLAs dump Rankin recreation money

Nunalik MLA Johnny Ningeongan has moved to remove $500,000 from the GN’s capital budget, money earmarked to plan and design a new recreational facility in Rankin Inlet. But Rankin Inlet South-Whale Cove MLA Lorne Kusugak said the money is to plan only for a new arena. (PHOTO BY SARAH ROGERS)

(Updated 6:45 p.m. Oct. 20)

Nunavut MLAs voted Oct. 20 in support of a motion that deletes $500,000 earmarked for the planning of a new recreation complex in Rankin Inlet from Nunavut’s proposed 2012-13 capital budget.

Eight MLAs voted in favour of the motion, while the assembly’s eight cabinet ministers abstained from voting.

Nunalik MLA Johnny Ningeongan introduced a motion to delete the amount from the Department of Community and Government Services budget in an Oct. 19 committee of the whole meeting.

That’s after MLAs discovered that the scope of Rankin Inlet’s project had gone from a basic arena to a complex that would house a games arena, curling rink, convention area and an Olympic-sized swimming pool.

“We’re asked to approve hundreds of thousands of dollars to pay for projects we have few details about,” said Hudson Bay MLA Allan Rumbolt just before MLAs voted Thursday afternoon.

Ningeongan, along with the MLAs who supported his motion, said he supported the idea of a new arena for Rankin Inlet, but was concerned the details of the project weren’t clearly laid out.

Ningeongan also presented the motion because the funding would have given an “unfair” advantage to one of the territory’s larger communities, he said, by using standards and criteria inherited from the Government of the Northwest Territories.

“So it’s pretty hard to approve that when a lot of the communities don’t even have an existing swimming pool,” Ningeongan told MLAs Oct. 19.

“And to try to use the existing criteria, I don’t believe it’s being followed properly… Small communities in Nunavut need to be involved…. in this process.”

Ningeongan said small communities — such as the two he represents, Coral Harbour and Chesterfield Inlet — are disadvantaged because they cannot acquire the resources needed to kickstart major infrastructure projects.

Standards and criteria are meant to protect small communities from these disadvantages, Ningeongan said.

But Rankin Inlet South-Whale Cover MLA Lorne Kusugak, also minister of Community and Government Services, said there are no standards and criteria regarding multiplex facilities in Nunavut.

The GN is in the “development stages to draft up these policies down the road,” he said.

Kusugak said the $500,000 was budgeted only for the planning and design of a new hockey arena.

The community opted for a new arena after it realized that upgrading the current arena could cost upwards of $10 million, Kusugak said.

The current facility is “deteriorated” and no longer meets the needs of what has become a very strong hockey community, Kusugak told MLAs Oct.19.

“The community has plans to build a swimming pool and other things and we shouldn’t criticize them for those aspirations,” Kusugak said.
“After this, the community will start looking for funds — outside of the government, if they have to — to build this arena.”

Following the vote, Kusugak thanked MLAs for “being open,” despite having voted down the project.

“What I hear is that they’re willing to reconsider this,” he said Oct. 20.

The 2010-11 capital estimates estimated the total cost for the arena project at about $16 million, although the Department of Community and Government Services has not indicated total projected costs for the recreational complex.

As part of the GN’s proposed capital budget, the CGS department is proposing to spend about $31.2 million in the 2012-13 fiscal year, down from about $34 million in 2011-12.