Family of 13 gets house in Apex thanks to QC

SEAN McKIBBON

IQALUIT — A family of 13 people from Pangnirtung have a house in Apex to live in instead of a shack, thanks in part to a helping hand from Qikiqtaaluk Corporation.

Iqaluit Housing Association manager Susan Spring told Nunatsiaq News that QC helped Jacoposee Tiglik and his family pay off the rent arrears they owed to the Pangnirtung housing authority, as well as money they owed to NTPC.

“They are now tenants in good standing,” Spring said.

QC president Jerry El would not confirm that QC helped out.

“With all of the different implications and the demand for housing that’s out there I’d much rather something like that didn’t get into the media. I know we helped a lot of people around Christmas. We had a lot of requests. I got three or four more requests on my table this morning,” Ell said.

For their part, Tiglik and his wife Jeannie Newkingak seem happy with their new home, smiling as they show the space off and apologizing that they don’t have enough furniture to sit on.

Until last Friday, the family was still living on a beach in Apex in a particle-board shack that Tiglik built with one of his sons in August to keep the family warm in the winter.

Tiglik, a print maker and singer from Pangnirtung, told Nunatsiaq News in November that he and his family left Pangnirtung because there were no jobs there. Although he found work in Iqaluit over the summer, finding housing proved to be a much more difficult task.

“Now that we have a house, everybody is happy for us,” said Tiglik through a translator. The family used his younger brother’s snowmobile and a kamotiq to transport their belongings during the move. He roles his eyes and laughs when he thinks of how many trips it took.

Although some members of the Iqaluit Housing Authority’s board of directors had been against putting the family on the waiting list, Susan Spring said the point was rendered moot once the family got a house.

“They said they were going to have a meeting, but then we called them (the housing authority) again and they just told us to pick up the key,” said Newkingak through a translator.

Her daughter Anna, who was pregnant while they were still living in the shack, gave birth to a baby boy Nov. 26. Newkingak said it was also good that they now had a home for the new baby.

Surprisingly, Newkingak said that none of the children had been sick while living in the shack on the beach. She and Tiglik, on the other hand, had caught quite a few colds.

“It’s a good thing we just moved into the house with him having a cold,” Leah said.

As for the shack, Tiglik said he would continue to work on it and repair it as a means of relaxing.