Proposed garage extension could relocate Resolute Bay baseball field

A plan to expand Resolute Bay’s municipal parking garage by relocating the community’s baseball field has raised the ire of at least one resident.

The High Arctic hamlet of roughly 200 residents was approved for $520,000 from the territorial government to support the planning phase of a four-bay extension to its existing two-bay garage, said interim chief administrative officer Ian Dudla.

The plans are to build a covered parking lot and heated storage space for municipal vehicles such as water and sewage service trucks.

The need for an extended parking garage goes back to at least 2021, in Resolute Bay’s 2021-22 infrastructure plan. The report highlighted the “increased risk of vandalism” and “decreased life expectancy” of municipal vehicles left outdoors due to lack of proper storage.

A survey sketch of the proposed six-bay parking garage extension drafted on Jan. 27. (Photo courtesy of Hamlet of Resolute Bay)

To accommodate the expansion, Resolute Bay council is in the process of amending a zoning bylaw to allow the garage to encroach onto a lot that currently hosts the hamlet’s baseball field.

Resident Joe Amarualik is critical of the proposed amendment, which went through a second public hearing in April.

“Why can’t our current council use designated industrial areas that are already surveyed? Why expand a garage into an open space?” he said.

The designated industrial area Amarualik is referencing was initially a metal dump located about a half-kilometre outside the hamlet.

However, an industrial lot was not considered “appropriate” for the proposed use of the garage, according to the written report to council delivered in February.

The industrial lot is bounded by a road in three directions, and is intended to be separate from community and residential developments to reduce noise and dust impacts.

A central location would support the provision of municipal services, the report said.

But keeping the baseball field in a central location has benefits too, said Amarualik.

“Our closest proximity to open space for baseball or other activities is mostly all gravel,” he said.

“We hope for our recreation area to be kept as a recreation area.”

He questioned where the hamlet intends to move the baseball field and how much that will cost.

Dudla, with the hamlet, assured residents the baseball field won’t move far.

“We recognize that the baseball diamond is a valuable asset for our community, and we do not want to lose it completely,” he said in an email to Nunatsiaq News.

“That is why we have plans to relocate it to be in vicinity of its original location.”

Dudla said Amarualik’s concerns did not come out at the April public meeting and the hamlet hasn’t received any written feedback on the project since.

A third reading for the amendment and one more public hearing is yet to be scheduled.

After that it goes to Community and Government Services Minister David Joanasie for final approval.