Iqaluit has enough licenced establishements

I am writing to comment on the petition for a bar that some people (who I thought would have better sense than to try to make money out of other people’s misery) would like to open in the most alcohol-based-problem town of the Baffin region.

Some of know first-hand that drinking and violence usually go hand-in-hand for some people. I heard an elder from Iqaluit go on the radio about this subject, and he said that most people who have frozen parts of their body or who have frozen to deeath had been drinking, and he is right when you think about it.

Some people have also committed suicide when they had been drinking. I have lost relatives and friends who have died from alcohol-related incidents and some usually in the cold of winter.

I would also like to get some answers on how the petition was done. Were the people who signed the petition permanent residents of Iqaluit? Or were they mostly transients who are in Iqaluit for a indefinite period of time until they can get a down payment on a house or a big boat or vehicle down south where they will eventually settle down away from Iqaluit?

I am a permanent resident of Iqaluit and I never saw a petition to for the bar and 1 am sure that the petition never went to the Elders’ Society for them to sign. I like the town of Iqaluit and I am proud that it was chosen as a capital, even though it is a town that everybody else who doesn’t live here (even some who live here) puts down as a problem-maker.

Those who think about opening liqour establishments and making money, should think about the the youth, who badly need some places to go to hang-outs with their friends.

We have enough hang-outs for the older people, in fact seven licensed establishments. That’s enough, eh?

A concerned resident
Iqaluit