• Proposed changes to the Nunavut government’s contracting and tendering policy could give a boost to Inuit-owned businesses and businesses that employ Inuit. The Nunavut government and Nunavut Tunngavik propose a sliding-scale point system to bring the territorial government’s practices into line with Article 24 of the Nunavut land claims agreement. This policy replaces the decade-old Business Incentive Policy, or "BIP," inherited from the GNWT.

• Working within a limited timetable, budget and mandate, the Nunavik Commission begins its community consultations. Its eight members must develop recommendations on the structure, operations and powers of a new government for Nunavik.

• Citing losses, injuries, gross indignities and abuse, people who were students of Inukjuak’s Port Harrison Federal Day School during the 1960s launch legal action against the federal government and some of the school’s former teachers and employees, some of whom are Inuit still residing in Inukjuak. The former students, most of whom still live in Inukjuak, are seeking $18.7 million in damages. This award would give $200,000 to each of the 42 plaintiffs, for a total of $13,700,000. Several also claim additional specific damages ranging from $5,000 to $200,000, while four plaintiffs seek an additional $1 million each for the repeated sexual and physical abuse they endured. The declaration, filed on Jan. 12 in Montreal, also asks that a sum of $5,040,000 be placed in trust to provide continued special psychological help for the plaintiffs and their families.

• Unionized health-care workers at Kuujjuaq’s Tulattavik Health Centre clamour for the Quebec government to improve their working conditions and benefits. More than 300 workers in communities along Ungava Bay who belong to a union affiliated with La Fédération de la santé et des services sociaux, Quebec’s health and social services union, hold a 24-hour strike.

• A group of 20 Nunavut Sivuniksavut students embark on a project to identify Inuit pictured in old photographs stored in Canada’s National Archives in Ottawa. "If we don’t ask them now, we won’t be able to later," says student Naomi Alivaktak of Pangnirtung.

• Iqaluit lawyer Anne Crawford says she’s "massively disappointed" in the Law Society of the Northwest Territories and will appeal their recent decision to reprimand her for comments made to the media on behalf of her client. Crawford says the decision "could inhibit freedom of expression." In reprimanding Crawford, the Law Society had said comments attributed to her in a 1996 CBC news story "violated the society’s code of conduct." Iqaluit businessman and former Town councillor Kenn Harper filed the complaint in 1997.

February

• An ugly new acronym pops up upon Nunavut’s orthographic horizon: NIG. The Nunavut Investment Group is the parent of the re-named Nunavut Construction (1999) Corp. and two new subsidiaries, NCC Properties Ltd. and NCC Development Ltd. No changes to the ownership and board of directors are reflected in the new conglomerate. NCC will continue to build houses and office buildings, while NCC Properties Ltd. will own and manage the $130 million in properties NCC has already built and leased to the GN. NCC Development Ltd. will seek funding for new contracts and business ventures. NCC was created in 1997 to build houses and offices for Nunavut government staff under a confidential agreement.

• Organizer Victor Mesher says an association for Montreal Inuit is "an idea whose time has come." The fledgling group has a name, the Association of Montreal Inuit, an interim board of directors and even a promise of office space. The Makivik Corporation’s board of directors decide to give AMI the use of one Makivik’s transit homes in Lachine for at least six months.

• The GN plans to use surplus funds to pay nearly $20 million in deficits accumulated by Nunavut’s three health boards between 1998 and 2000. Finance Minister Kelvin Ng says his department will review the health boards’ spending to determine whether their deficits are a result of government under-funding or are due to over-spending by the boards. The government’s surplus is a result of money slated for salaries and benefits for territorial government jobs that remained unfilled.

• Two Iqaluit men are headed to the North Pole this spring in an attempt to prove it can be done travelling 30 to 40 miles per day using sled dogs. Paul Landry and Paul Crowley will start their journey from the northern tip of Ellesmere Island and re-trace Peary’s route to the Pole.

• An Iqaluit man, Kootoo Korgak, 32, faces a first-degree murder charge in connection with the death of Inusiq Sarah Akavak, his common-law wife. Akavak, 39, was found dead Feb. 10 in her apartment in Iqaluit’s eight-story high-rise.

• Five years ago this month, Nunavimmiut and Falconbridge Ltd. signed the Raglan Agreement, a deal designed to give Inuit a share in the giant mining company’s new nickel mine. After intense and expensive catch-up training, the percentage of Inuit employed at Falconbridge’s Raglan subsidiary, the Société minière Raglan du Québec, stands only at 15 per cent, or 54 employees.

• A bli ard in Rankin Inlet forces Nunavut’s top bureaucrats and politicians to take refuge in Yellowknife, thus delaying the legislative assembly session opening scheduled for Feb. 16 in Rankin Inlet.

• In Puvirnituq, Judge Louis DeBlois of Quebec’s Superior Court sentences Taamusi Angyiou, 26, of Akulivik to life in prison. Angyiou will not be eligible for parole for 15 years. This is the first life sentence for murder in Nunavik. In December, 1999, Angiyiou had pleaded guilty to second degree murder in the death of Evie Luuku, also of Akulivik. On April 6, 1998, in Akulivik, Angyiou had entered Luuku’s house and killed her. Angyiou also pleaded guilty to other related charges: using a firearm while committing a crime, unlawful confinement and sexual assault.

March

•The Baffin Regional Health and Social Services Board will disband Apr. 1; they’ll be replaced by community committees — called committees-in-council. The new groups will get $5,000 each in seed money.

• On March 31, Nunavimmiut overwhelmingly re-elect Pita Aatami as president of the Makivik Corporation. Nearly 3,000 of Nunavik’s 4,676 eligible beneficiaries turn out for the election, giving Aatami 73.9 per cent of the total vote. Aatami wins a majority in every Nunavik community, in Montreal, at the Raglan mine, and among delegates attending the annual general meeting in Kuujjuaq. He receives 2,152 votes, while Sen. Charlie Watt receives 661 and Adamie A. Kadjulik receives 87.

• Inuit and Arctic residents should have a separate tax bracket, says Okalik Eegeesiak, the president of the Inuit Tapirisat of Canada, reflecting on the recently unveiled federal budget. Eegeesiak said the budget doesn’t reflect the higher prices northerners pay for food, shelter and clothing, but does mirror the incomes earned in the Arctic, which are higher than their southern counterparts. An Inuit family living on a $25,000-$30,000 income has reduced spending power compared with a family earning the same income in the South, she said.

• Long-time Inuit politician Peter Irniq, 53, will be sworn as commissioner of Nunavut in an Investiture ceremony in Iqaluit attended by the Governor General, Adrienne Clarkson.

• Levi Barnabas, speaker of Nunavut’s legislative assembly, is arrested and charged with sexually assaulting an adult female in Iqaluit. The Quittiktuq MLA will step down as speaker, but retain his seat in the legislature. Later in the year, MLAs force him to resign his seat after he pleads guilty to the charge.

• The government of Nunavut records a $34.1 million surplus, $24.9 million as a result of reduced spending and $9.2 million in revenues in excess of what was projected in the last fiscal year. The total projected revenues for 2000-2001 are $639 million, an increase of $9.2 million over the 1999-2000 fiscal year. The GN will spend some of its one-time surplus in its 2000-2001 budget, said Kelvin Ng, Nunavut’s finance minister. The reduced spending is mostly a result of the government’s inability to find staff.

• Arviat MLA Kevin O’Brien, of Arviat, is elected speaker of Nunavut’s legislative assembly. O’Brien replaces Levi Barnabas.

• Nunavut’s education department will get the largest share of the Nunavut government’s budget this year — 23 per cent. In addition, Finance Minister Kelvin Ng announces a $1.2 million initiative to attract more teachers to Nunavut. The president of the Federation of Nunavut Teachers, Donna Stephania, says the money will pay for only 12-14 new teaching positions.

• Nunavut’s minister of Culture, Language, Elders and Youth, Donald Havioyak, resignes Mar. 29. Havioyak said he wanted to spend more time in his home community of Kugluktuk helping people. The community has been shaken by a number of suicides and attempted suicides recently.

April

• The Makivik Corporation and the Qikiqtani Inuit Association lodge official complaints with Canada and Quebec over their governments’ "extermination program" of sled dogs from 1950 to 1975. The two Inuit birthright organizations ask the federal government to call for a joint public inquiry into the "government-ordered" dog-killing. Makivik wants Quebec to hold a separate provincial inquiry. The dogs were shot, ostensibly, to control canine diseases such as rabies and distemper, and also to reduce numbers of loose dogs. Until snowmobiles became common, hunters with no dog teams had trouble providing their families with food, and quickly became dependent on government hand-outs to meet their daily needs.

• About 30 pre-schoolers and day-care workers march on the Nunavut legislature in Iqaluit to protest cuts to day care funding in the territorial government’s budget.

• Peter Kattuk becomes Sanikiluaq’s first territorial cabinet minister when he is appointed minister of Culture, Language, Elders and Youth.

• Quebec coroner Jacques Bérubé returns to Kangiqsualujjaq to personally release his report on the circumstances around the deaths caused by the community’s Jan. 1, 1999 avalanche. Those expecting accusations of negligence or recriminations are disappointed. Bérubé says he wanted to keep the debate on a higher level. "Personally, I feel that many of those involved were lax in intervening or deciding not to intervene," Bérubé writes. But he stops short of pointing any fingers at the various officials who built the school in a dangerous place and then let it stay open. Instead, Bérubé directs a total of 20 recommendations to the Quebec government and its ministers of public security and health and social services.

• Nunavut MLAs approve the Department of Education’s budget after a delay caused by a controversy that arose over the cost of a new $14.7 million replacement school in Cambridge Bay.

• Ottawa will give Nunavut $1 million a year over the next four years towards new home-care programs, Health Minister Ed Picco announces. The programs will allow some patients to receive treatment in their homes with the help of trained people, Picco says.

• More than 200 Nunavimmiut from every community in the region gather in Kuujjuaq for the Katutjiniq Socio-economic Conference. Sponsored by Quebec, the conference is mainly intended to guide communities and governments in how to hand out money for projects. Their plans include 495 projects that they would like to realize over the next five years. Nunavik’s Liberal MP, Guy St-Julien, comes with two high-powered federal politicians in tow, Francis Gagliano, the minister responsible for the Canada Housing and Mortgage Corp., and Denis Codère, Secretary of State for sports and recreation. Gagliano confirms a new deal on social housing for Nunavik that will mean $50 million over 5 years for the region.

• Quebec’s minister of municipal affairs, Louise Harel, takes an ulu and slices the sealskin ribbon draped in front of the Kativik Municipal Housing Bureau’s new offices in Kuujjuaq. As a result of this move, Nunavik gains 19 jobs, although the transfer from Quebec City’s Société d’habitation du Québec — the SHQ — to this new regional body will cost the province an extra $2.5 million a year in operating expenses. With an annual budget of $25 million, the new housing bureau, a non-profit organization, will be able to count on $19 million a year from Quebec. The balance of its budget must come from rent collected from the occupants of Nunavik’s 1,716 social housing units.

May

• Sanikiluaq residents wake up with no heat or light after a fire guts the community’s power plant. The situation forces the territorial government to declare Nunavut’s first state of emergency.

• Premier Paul Okalik announces that the next wave of decentralized Nunavut government jobs in the Baffin region will go to Pond Inlet, Pangnirtung and Cape Dorset. Most are within regional functions that existed before division. The education department’s Baffin adult program office will move to Pangnirtung, while the Department of Community Government and Transportation will relocate 25 jobs to Cape Dorset. Pond Inlet is expected to get eight jobs within the Department of Sustainable Development, as well as 24 jobs in the Public Works department.

• In Nunavik, seven out of nine families who lost members in Kangiqsualujjuaq’s disastrous avalanche of Jan. 1, 1999, seek damages. Notices of intention are filed against Quebec’s education department, its public security department, the municipality of Kangiqsualujjuaq, and the Kativik School Board. The total amount of damages sought is around $1.8 million.

• Housing Minister Manitok Thompson pledges to take action on housing recommendations made in a report released by one of the Nunavut legislature’s standing committees. The report suggests that the government review rent scales and assess the territory’s housing needs. Thompson says the report, which is supposed to find long-term solutions to Nunavut’s housing shortage, will not be ignored.

• In Nunavik, a frightening inferno frustrates the Kuujjuaq volunteer fire department’s best attempts to bring it under control. The two storey, four-plex apartment building, owned by the Kativik School Board, is a total loss.

• Ottawa announces it’s going to pump $1.7 million into five Nunavut airports to improve air safety. Airports in Rankin Inlet, Arviat, Coral Harbour, Qikiqtarjuaq and Whale Cove will each get between $213,000 and $449,000 from the federal government

• A joint investigation by the Sûreté du Québec and the Kativik Regional Police Force results in a spectacular seizure of drugs bound for Nunavik and Nunavut, including six kilos of hash, 21 grams of cocaine, three vehicles and $130,000 in cash. The drugs, with a street value of at least $300,000, were destined for communities throughout Nunavik and five Nunavut communities, including Iqaluit, Cape Dorset and Sanikiluaq. Gilles Allard, Michel Leblanc, Desmond Clark, Daniel Roy, George Coman and Susie Pootoogee are arrested on charges of trafficking and possession.

June

• Nunavut Tunngavik Inc. announces it’s suing the federal government over the new firearms legislation. NTI says the Firearms Act violates Inuit rights guaranteed by the Nunavut land claims agreement. The act states that all gun owners have to register their guns and take a firearm safety course. Two weeks later, the Nunavut government comes out in support of NTI, saying it will seek intervenor status in NTI’s court action.

• In Nunavik, Quebec’s minister of education, François Legault, finally makes it official: the Kativik School Board can start its long-awaited move to Nunavik. Quebec allots $6.2 million for the first phase of the school board’s relocation to Kuujjuaq. Later in the year, however, the Quebec government announces that the move will be delayed.

• A government biologist caught injecting himself with polar bear tranquilizer returns to his job with the Nunavut government’s Department of Sustainable Development. The biologist, Peter Krizan, injected himself with Zotetil while doing field research on polar bears. He had to be medivaced out of the area to be treated for a drug overdose. An investigation launched into the incident resulted in Krizan having his certificate to do experimental studies revoked. Still, Krizan is allowed to return to his job with the Nunavut government.

• In Nunavik, Markoosie Weetaltuk, 18, of Kuujjuaraapik faces 11 charges in connection with several violent incidents and a vehicle chase during which a policeman is shot and Weetaltuk is also shot by police. The charges include attempted murder, sexual assault, pointing a firearm, using a firearm while committing an indictable offence, flight, dangerous driving, mischief and assault with a weapon.

• The Nunavut government unveils a new patient-travel policy that will allow more patients to have escorts when they travel to hospitals in the South. But there will be stiff regulations: Patient escorts who don’t go to appointments with patients may be asked to pay back the cost of the trip.

• Nunavut’s cash-strapped libraries miss out on getting millions of dollars from an American foundation. Representatives from the Bill and Melinda Gates foundation visited several Nunavut libraries and were ready to donate a huge sum of cash. But the GN couldn’t give the foundation any concrete ideas about what Nunavut’s libraries might need the money for.

• Inuit elders say the Arctic’s climate is changing. About 30 elders were interviewed by Shari Fox, a Ph.D. student at the University of Colorado, and told her they’re noticing a shift in the weather.

• Jose Kusugak defeats incumbent Okalik Eegeesiak to become the new head of the Inuit Tapirisat of Canada. Kusugak, a former NTI president, says he will address the gun-control legislation and help the Labrador Inuit in settling their land claim. He says ITC has a strong role to play in issues such as housing and education that aren’t specifically dealt with by land claims organizations.

• In Nunavik, a break in a pipe loading ore causes 1,000 pounds of powdery nickel concentrate to spill out on the decks of the MV Arctic, over the sea ice near the ship, and into the frigid waters of Deception Bay.

July

• Doctors warn people to eat only fully-cooked hamburger meat following reports that 15 people tested positive for E. coli infections, or "hamburger disease," in Nunavut. The greatest number of infections were in Arviat, although some were also reported in Hall Beach and Clyde River. Most of the cases are a direct result of people eating undercooked hamburger meat.

• A crippling shortage of nurses forces the Baffin Regional Hospital to cut back from 18 to 12 beds for in-patient care. Low levels of pay and Nunavut’s high cost of living mean there aren’t enough nurses to staff the hospital. Even with pay benefits announced last year, the Nunavut government is still having a difficult time recruiting nurses.

• In Nunavik, a keen and physically fit group of young people sets out to travel by canoe from one coast of Nunavik to the other. Nunavik 2000 involves 80 Cadets and Junior Rangers, 15-18 years old, from Nunavik, Canada and Britain. Ten large canoes, each with nine young reservists and an experienced instructor from the armed forces, head out from Lake Minto and then continue along Leaf River to the community of Tasiujaq — a 500-kilometre trek.

• The Nunavut government says it plans to train local people to fill the decentralized jobs that it’s moving to smaller communities. Kelvin Ng, Nunavut’s human resources minister, says 42 jobs have to be filled and the government has set money aside for the training.

• B.C’s health minister comes to Iqaluit to help Nunavut create an anti-smoking campaign. Mike Farmworth says the program has been so successful in one B.C. school that smoking among students has dropped from 28 per cent to seven per cent. Nunavut’s health minister, Ed Picco, hopes the program will help in Nunavut, where 70 per cent of teenagers smoke.

• In Nunavik, from July 23 to Aug. 3, the Eastern Arctic Music Festival takes over Inukjuak. The 23rd edition of the music festival, which has grown from a small gathering to a big bash, attracts musicians and fans from across the North.

• A survey on daycare centres in Nunavut catches the Education Department off guard. Ninety per cent of the territory’s daycares report they’re operating with insufficient funds. The department is surprised by this revelation, saying it believed the centres were getting adequate funding. In September, Premier Paul Okalik announces major reforms in the way the government funds day cares, including an immediate 10 per cent funding hike for Nunavut’s 30 child-care centres, and a funding-formula alteration to funnel $363,000 more per year to the centres.

August

• The Nunavut Housing Corp. goes on a house hunt of sorts. The department seeks out home owners who are willing to lease housing units to the corporation to use as additional public housing. With almost 1,000 Nunavummiut on waiting lists for public housing, it is part of a project to increase the number of housing units in the territory. Under the plan, the units would be leased in several Nunavut communities for a five-year period.

• In Nunavik, a blaze threatens the neighbouring communities of Kuujjuaraapik and Whapmagoostui, and leads to the evacuation of 250 residents. At its height, the fire covers five square kilometers and has flames that reach more than 60 metres into the air. Rain eventually snuffs the fire out, but the response to this potential disaster turns out to be a good test of community preparedness.

• Levi Barnabas resigns his seat as the MLA for Quttiktuq under pressure from other MLAs. This comes one week after he pled guilty to sexually assaulting an Iqaluit woman in March, 2000. He won’t serve jail time, but will serve a 12-month conditional sentence. The light sentence sparks a public outcry, especially from the national Inuit women’s organization Pauktuutit.

• Nunavik residents suffering from mental illness or handicaps will finally be able to get help without having to leave the region. On Aug. 23, Nunavik’s first regional reintegration centre celebrates its official opening in Inukjuak.

• A GN report calls for "Inuit Qaujimajatuqangit," or Inuit knowledge, to be incorporated into the workplace. In the report, the territorial government recommends that non-Inuit staff get mandatory Inuktitut language lessons, and that Inuit staff get days off for hunting and gathering. The recommendations are mostly aimed at making the workplace more comfortable for Inuit employees.

• The federal government announces it will transfer responsibility for administering the Nunavut sealift to the territorial government. The sealift was originally administered by the Canadian Coast Guard. At the end of the 2000 shipping season, the GN will be responsible for the gathering, transporting and delivering of ordered cargo shipped to Nunavut.

• When students under the Kativik School Board return to class in Nunavik’s communities, some find there are no teachers on hand to greet them. In the past the KSB received up to 1,500 applications for positions, but this year the school board received only 300 applications for 50 openings.

• Nanulik MLA James Arvaluk is arrested in Coral Harbour, his home community, on a charge of assault causing bodily harm. A few days later he resigns his post as education minister. In September the Coral Harbour hamlet council calls on him to resign his seat. "We have come to a situation that we as residents of Coral Harbour cannot and will not ignore any longer," reads a public statement approved unanimously by the hamlet council. But at year’s end, Arvaluk continues to sit as an MLA.

September

• In a bid to keep down costs and decentralize services, the Nunavut government says it may build two regional jails rather than a single "super jail" that would likely have been constructed in Iqaluit. The proposed regional jails would be located in the Kivalliq and Kitikmeot, and would be 20-bed minimum-security facilities. Their combined cost would be less than that of the $50 million super jail.

• Starting Sept. 1 in Nunavik, Kuujjuamiut pay $1.23 a litre for gas. Furnace oil costs 17 cents more a litre this year than last year, while premium jet fuel skyrockets from 92 cents a litre to $1.20 a litre. Diesel fuel is up from $1.01 to $1.25 a litre. The across-the-board increase is around 20 per cent.

• Northern Canada’s most reviled pedophile, Ed Horne, is sentenced to a five-year prison term after being convicted of sexually molesting numerous boys while he worked as a teacher in Sanikiluaq and Cape Dorset from 1972-83. He was also found guilty of buggering an Iqaluit boy in 1983. Many of the social ills that still linger in those communities are attributed to his crimes. The sentence comes after Horne had already served jail time for sexual assaults he committed against boys in Kimmirut and Cape Dorset in the mid-80s. Sanikiluaq residents protest the ruling in a petition, saying Horne should go to jail for "a lot more years."

• In Nunavik, many workers with the Inuulitsivik Health Board are up in arms over mix-ups in their paychecks. Disgruntled staff say they’ve received some very pu ling pays checks with some employees being paid more money than usual and others much less. More than 500 errors — ranging from a few to several thousand dollars — are found in the pay records.

• In a report to the Kativik Regional Government, Nunavik Commissioner Harry Tulugak provides an outline of how Nunavik’s new regional government might look. A Nunavik assembly will have up to 23 elected members — one each from smaller communities, and two from larger ones. A president, chairperson or perhaps even "premier" would be elected from all eligible resident voters in Nunavik. There would be a second, independent assembly made up of elders who would consult with the government in matters related to language and culture. Elections would be held every three years and Inuttitut would be the working language of government.

• Only four months after Sanikiluaq’s power plant burns down, it’s lights-out for Kugluktuk as a fire in that community’s generator station leaves residents on limited heat and light for more than a day. New generators are air-lifted in from the south.

• The first snow of the season trips up a First Air jet at the Iqaluit airport. The Boeing 727-200, landing after a northbound flight from Ottawa, skids partially off the runway at high speed and blows two tires before coming to a rest at a rakish angle, half on and half off the tarmac. The passengers are evacuated and taken to the hospital, but none are injured.

• A coalition of Canadian scientists calls for a dramatic increase in the funding of Arctic studies. A report authored by the group says polar researchers have been left demoralized by years of government funding cuts. The scientists call for an additional $23.5 million to be spent each year on research in the North, and suggest that Arctic residents be more directly involved in the science that takes place in their backyard.

October

• A trailblazing study traces deadly toxins in Nunavut to specific sources thousands of kilometres away in the South. The study, conducted by renowned American scientist Barry Commoner, links dioxin contamination at eight locations in Nunavut to 44,000 polluters, mostly in southern Canada and the United States. Dioxin is a chemical classed as a POP, or persistent organic pollutant. The study will give Inuit the power to target individual polluters, which could be a breakthrough in the effort to reduce POPs in the Arctic , says Sheila Watt-Cloutier, the head of the Inuit Circumpolar Conference for Canada.

• Nunavut will shift to eastern time for the winter, announces Jack Anawak, the minister of community government. The move, meant to appease Baffin residents angry over the government’s 1999 decision to unify the territory under central time, instead prompts outrage and rebellion in the Kitikmeot. Rather than switching, Cambridge Bay’s council votes to remain on central time, while far-west Kugluktuk opts for mountain time. A stand-off ensues, and for several chaotic days the clocks of GN workers, teachers and students in the two communities are out of synch with those of the rest of the residents. Finally, the GN concedes and says the communities may stay on central time.

• Quebec’s First Nations say the process and principles guiding the Nunavik Commission are flawed and put native rights at risk. The Nunavik Commissioners hear from Innu lawyer Armand Mackenzie, Ted Moses, the grand chief of the James Bay Crees, and Ghislain Picard, head of the Assembly of First Nations of Quebec and Labrador. In their opinion, Nunavimmiut have been sold a sovereignist package of goods that could have far-reaching — and negative — consequences for other aboriginal peoples in Quebec. "I understand the Inuit have a vision of government as a people, but they should not forget the other aboriginal peoples living on this land," says Mackenzie, following his appearance in front of the commission.

• Nunavummiut join the nation in mourning the death of Pierre Elliot Trudeau. Trudeau, the "daring and dashing" former prime minister of Canada, led the nation in the years when the dream of Nunavut was born. Trudeau was well known for having a special love of the North, and many Nunavut residents fondly remember meeting him during his trips to the eastern Arctic.

• In Kuujjuaq, Willie Gordon, 42, pleads guilty to possession of hashish with the intent to traffic, as well as to a separate charge of trafficking. These charges are in connection with a seizure of 1.78 kilos of hashish. In November, Gordon is sentenced to 14 months in jail. He later appeals the sentence, saying that under the James Bay and Northern Quebec Agreement, he shouldn’t go to a prison in the South. Gordon is a former employee of the Kativik Regional Government, as well as a former director of Kuujjuaq’s landholding and development corporations. Bobby Gordon, 20, and Jobie Gordon, 32, also plead guilty to possession of hashish in connection with the same seizure.

• Nunavut’s capital gets a new mayor. In the Iqaluit municipal election, councillor John Matthews handily defeats incumbent Jimmy "Flash" Kilabuk and former vice-mayor Ben Ell to take the town’s top job. A slate of unusually qualified candidates are also elected to the municipal council, auguring well for the community that will soon be Nunavut’s first city.

• The Nunavut government’s workforce continues to shrink. That admission comes from Kelvin Ng, Nunavut’s minister of human resources, on the opening day of the fall assembly session in Iqaluit. According to Ng, despite GN hiring efforts vacancies within the government have increased in the last six months. A year-and-a-half after the founding of Nunavut, nearly a quarter of the GN’s jobs remain unfilled.

• Olayuk Akesuk, the MLA for South Baffin, becomes the territory’s newest cabinet minister. In a cabinet shuffle, Premier Paul Okalik would later put Akesuk in charge of the sustainable development department and give Peter Kilabuk the top job at the education department. The cabinet opening came in August, when Nanulik MLA James Arvaluk resigned as education minister after being charged with assault causing bodily harm.

• A meeting in Kuujjuaq between hunters and officials from the Department of Fisheries and Oceans is a step towards a new beluga-management plan that must be struck by March, 2001. Placing limits on beluga is unfair, say Nunavik hunters. Many communities exceed their quotas, and, over past years, some hunters have even killed beluga in protected areas or during closed hunting seasons. Some hunters race to take as many beluga as they can to make sure they get their share.

• Guy Chevrette, Quebec’s minister responsible for parks, presides over two days of public hearings on the proposed Pingualuit crater park in Kangiqsujuaq. The crater, located 88 kilometres southwest from Kangiqsujuaq — and not far from the Raglan nickel mine — is the result of a meteorite that crashed there 1.4 million