Inukjuak: From outpost camp to modern town

SIASI SMILER

KUUJJUAQ — I come from a town that is considered the second or third largest in Nunavik, depending on the source of the statistics.

Our community is composed of seven distinct and dynamic groups. When I was six years old, there were six camps around Inukjuak. Vibrant, self-sufficient, interdependent communities, we made our own homes, and provided for the needs of our children and elders on a day-to-day basis.

Between 1965 and 1975, the families from these settlements were relocated to Inukjuak. They brought with them their customs and competence, and a lifestyle suited to the outpost camp environment.

That was barely 25 years ago!

Our community today looks much like this one — Kuujjuaq, except that we have fewer major businesses and less infrastructure. Our population today is 1,300, 800 of whom are under 35 years of age.

And our elders, the adults of the camps that were relocated in the 1960s and 1970s, today find it hard to offer us the guidance and support we so desperately need. Their life experience has been so wrapped in change… change after change after change. The impact of this change can be seen everywhere.

We can’t make our own houses, and we are about 50 houses short today. At times we have three families sharing as many bedrooms.

And specific and very devastating social issues have become part of our reality — child neglect, family violence, alcohol and drug abuse, youth suicide.

Our families, the basic unit of community, and the key to our survival in the past, have become disoriented. The rules have all been changed, and the families have not had a chance to catch up, to adjust.

As a leader, I must admit that I am not able to serve the community as well as I would like. I must say, however, that I am very proud of my community. I am proud of the people of Inukjuak.

We have managed to survive and thrive under conditions beyond anything ever known to our ancestors, We have struggled to accommodate the requirements, needs and wishes of the visitors to our land, in an effort to improve our daily reality as it is.

And looking around this room today, I would say Nunavimmiut have done better than we could have dared to expect.

But the bottom lime is that I am still having to operate according to the traditional Inuit way — survival. Although I am not hunting to provide food for my community, I hunt for resources through government.

Using the resources I am able to find, and with the support and wisdom of my fellow councilors, we make the best decisions we can to provide for the needs of our community. Barely making ends meet, struggling to meet all the conditions and requirements of the various funding bodies, we try to stay out of a deficit, hardly daring to dream of the future.

Our community has become dependent on the goods and services offered by the dominant society. I must juggle our needs and wants with the dollars and cents which may, or may not, be granted to our community by the various levels of government.

The main employers of the community are government funded, directly or indirectly. The creation of new jobs, construction and expansion tends to be linked to the main regional agencies, according to their vision and their priorities.

For 20 years, our youth have struggled to have a gathering place, moving from one condemned building to another old un-renovated space, to the constant repetition of the words “our children are our future.” I wish I could take you on a tour of our youth building — it’s a blue building, one or two windows, run down and bare, no washrooms, old furniture, a TV and some video games, for 600 young people!

We need jobs, but those people willing to take the risk to develop their own businesses and provide much needed employment in our community must also be willing to take on old buildings, and struggle with limited resources.

We have not been able to expand our economic base. We are not a regional centre, jobs are scarce. There are young, strong, healthy people in my community who have never had a job. Not because they don’t want to work, not because they weren’t offered enough money, but quite simply, because they are no jobs.

In spite of the loss of many traditional ways and the expensive requirements of a subsistence harvest, we are lucky that our people continue to share as much as they do. Our situation would be much worse if they did not.

Today, in Inukjuak, we have many extended families who depend on one family member who has a job. An employed person in my community may actually end up providing for up to four families at a time.

As a mayor, I feel programmed just to keep my head above water. A lot of the time, I feel lucky just to be able to balance my budget and avoid a deficit. Sometimes, like this year, I am borrowing not to lose more money and equipment, not to improve or build upon what we already have.

My vision for Inukjuak is actually a simple one.

I’d like to see our community vibrant and busy, a place where children are safe, to learn and be safe, where adults can feel proud of their abilities to provide for their families by their own efforts, where elders are nutured and cared for.

My vision includes the handicapped, the intellectually compromised, our members with special needs who help us be that little bit more than we would be on our own.

My vision provides for health and support, according to need, and freedom from prejudice and violence… laughter in the homes, and in our community gathering places — of which we would have many — and a strong sense of connection and accountability, for each other and to each other.

It may sound utopian to some of you, but I believe it is what we were born to… and with real commitment and support, we can get there.

How? By moving a feel steps past “making ends meet” and “meeting the requirements” and “adjusting” to fiscal realities. By making real choices on development and growth, direction and priorities that belong to us, come good times and bad.

I sometimes wonder about this new “environment” so many government leaders are referring to. Can self-determination ever be negotiated, or must it simply we acknowledged and accepted?

If government is sincere, and I would like to believe in that, the time for control is past.

Thank you.

Editor’s note: This is a text of Ms. Smiler’s speech to delegates at the Katujiniq conference.