What kind of year was 2018? Like any calendar year, the past one had its ups and downs – starting with the rain.
Much of the territory experienced a wetter than normal summer, which meant plenty of bugs and ruined camping trips, but also much needed relief from the drought conditions of previous years that caused so much of the territory's forests to burn.
The year witnessed major achievements by Northerners and organizations who help make the Northwest Territories a better place to live, such as the Arctic Indigenous Wellness Foundation which was awarded the $1-million Arctic Inspiration Prize in January to build a traditional healing centre in Yellowknife to help the “homeless and at-risk populations” in the territory.
SMASH (Strength, Masculinities and Sexual Health) also received a $1-million boost – this one from Health Canada to help fund the group's efforts to teach young men about sexual responsibility and sexual health.
2018 saw many issues affecting Indigenous people come to the forefront. The National Inquiry into Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women and Girls visited the territory in January, opening a window for the nation at large into the grief and despair afflicting so many lives in the North.
The family of Aklavik elder Hugh Papik, meanwhile, was still waiting for answers and recommendations from the territorial government after staff mistook his stroke symptoms for drunkenness. His death in August 2016 revealed that institutional discrimination toward Indigenous people remains a problem.
On a lighter note, the Dene Nation had its first new national chief in 15 years with the election of former Sahtu MLA Norman Yakeleya.
Last year witnessed the passing of some prominent people in media and broadcasting, starting with Cece Hodgson-McCauley, who died at age 95 last March after 40 years of writing a weekly column for News/North – many of them railing for a highway through the Mackenzie Valley. A small portion of her dream was celebrated last November with opening of the 14-kilometre Canyon Creek Road outside Norman Wells, which it is hoped will some day be a part of the highway connecting the North to the south.
Also lost last year was former CBC host and CKLB station manager Les Carpenter, known to his many fans in the North as “Mr. Saturday Night.” Closer to home for Northern News Services was the passing of our founder Jack “Sig” Sigvaldason,” who started his northern media empire on his kitchen table in 1972. Today the company includes seven weekly newspapers and two websites.
It was a trying year in many respects for the territorial government. There were some successes, including the launching of a permanent day shelter and sobering centre in Yellowknife, but rough going on many other files. Two cabinet ministers, Glen Abernethy and Wally Schumann, had to fight for their jobs in the legislative assembly after yet another auditor general report gave Abernethy's child and family services division a failing grade and Schumann's Infrastructure department missed the boat on re-supplying Beaufort communities before freeze-up.
Education Minister Caroline Cochrane welcomed a foundational review of Aurora College that called for the construction of a polytechnic university in Yellowknife, but the prospect of moving headquarters out of Fort Smith threatens to sow division between the capital and communities yet again. Meanwhile, Alberta Achievement Test results showed that students in the territory, particularly in smaller communities, continue to lag far behind.
To add to the concern for the GNWT – and the territory as a whole – is the unsettled labour dispute between the government and its workers, who have threatened to strike.
There is no sign that these and other challenges won't continue to bedevil the territory in 2019. It's difficult to predict what the new year will bring. All we can be certain about is that there won't be any shortage of news. For all of us in the territory, we hope the majority of it is good.