Elections in Northern Saskatchewan communities are coming up at the beginning of November, including in the Northern Village of Île-à-la-Crosse.
The 2020 election will see two candidates run for mayor, incumbent Duane Favel and newcomer Peter Durocher. Eight names will be on the ballot for the six seats at the council table. Here is what the candidates had to say about their candidacy and the upcoming council term.
Mayor
Peter Durocher
Being a part of the Île-à-la-Crosse community all his life, Peter Durocher said he sees a lot of places where he would like to make changes that haven’t been done, especially around mental health and economic development. This is the main driver for his run for mayor.
Durocher worked as a paramedic for 18 years before being diagnosed with PTSD two years ago. Durocher now does contract conservation work with the Métis Nation but still is passionate about seeing changes to mental health support in the province.
Bringing more economic development to the area is another area that Durocher wants to focus on if elected. Being recognized by the local mining industry is an important factor in that, he said, and that conversation needs to happen.
“I just want to make sure that Île-à-la-Crosse is looked at as being one of the communities that is affected by everything on our lands.”
Fixing the problems in Île-à-la-Crosse goes beyond improving the local economy and bringing in more industry, Durocher said. More needs to be fixed that goes beyond financial security.
“If we don't have to fix the problems we have with our community, mental health and drug and alcohol abuse, we’ll still have the same problem even though people are richer.”
Building support for a treatment centre for the Northwest side of the province to support residents going through mental health and addiction issues is one of the things that Durocher will be proposing if elected.
Duane Favel
After four terms as mayor of Île-à-la-Crosse, Duane Favel will be going for his fifth during this 2020 election.
Born and raised in Île-à-la-Crosse, Favel said he loves his community and would like to continue to be a public servant to make things better.
“I just want to be able to continue to use my skills and my knowledge that I have gained over time to continue to support the community and move it forward.”
While COVID-19 has been the council’s main focus since March 2020, high water levels have also caused problems for the community over the summer. This has been an ongoing problem for years, he said, but he wants to see something be done in this upcoming term to address the issue and protect the community, which sits on a peninsula on Lac Île-à-la-Crosse.
For the foreseeable future, the number priority will be the community’s response to COVID-19, including supporting physicians and COVID positive patients.
“I want to support them in as many different ways as we can, including finding places for self isolation.”
Other issues that are happening in Île-à-la-Crosse are problems that occur across the province, he said, but Favel wants to continue to lobby for government support for his community in the realms of mental health and addictions.
Favel was an educator at Saskatoon’s Oskāyak High School before returning to Île-à-la-Crosse as a researcher with the University of Alberta, University of Saskatchewan, and the Northwest Métis.
Councillor
Vincent Ahenakew
Vincent Ahenakew was the youngest member of the Île-à-la-Crosse village council when he first was elected in 1990. Looking around the table now, he is one of the oldest but there is still more to be done to promote and help the community, he said.
Thirty years as a village councillor, Ahenakew estimates that he has read a couple hundred thousand pages of village documents preparing for council meetings. He has learned a lot in that position, he said, and has enjoyed meeting new people and making decisions to better the community. His hope is that the people will choose him for at least one more term, he said.
COVID-19 will continue to be the number one concern for the council going into the next term, Ahenakew said, with community safety of Île-à-la-Crosse residents being the key goal.
“We've got quite a few of our elders out in different communities and a lot of the families are saying they want to be home from some of the southern communities. So that’s been one of the things that we've been talking about in our past council meetings. That's something that we'd like to work on,” Ahenakew said.
Connecting students with the land and culture is also a major goal for his upcoming term, he said.
Ahenakew works as the principal of the Rossignol High School in Île-à-la-Crosse but he is thinking of retirement depending on when he wins the lottery, he said with a laugh.
Edna Daigneault
This will not be the first time Edna Daigneault has been on the ballot for the Île-à-la-Crosse municipal election, but she is more mature now than other times, she said, and hopes to see a future at the council table.
The grade nine teacher at Rossignol High School said as she gets older, she wants to start giving back to the community.
Daigneault does not have any specific goals in mind for the next council term but would like to start learning about how the Northern village is governed, like how bylaws and policies are put in place. Learning more will help Daigneault add on her already strong interests in her community, she said.
“I’ll probably find myself interested in a few spots. Being an educator, family is very important to me. Being in my 60s, the elder area would probably come my way. Being a strong Métis woman is another area I would probably gravitate to.”
From an environmental standpoint, Daigneault would also like to support sustainable land programs, she said, with more checks and balances for government-endorsed land deals that will impact the community. Daigneault is the daughter of a herbalist and still collects plants herself. She understands the knowledge lost if a logging company was ever given access to the land, she said.
Bodean Desjarlais
Three years is not long enough to get fully immersed in municipal politics. That is the reason Bodean Desjarlais is putting his name on the ballot once again for the municipal election in Île-à-la-Crosse, he said.
The 25-year-old was elected in a byelection and he is much more comfortable with his role as a village councillor and understands how municipal, provincial, and federal politics all work together, he said.
“I feel with that knowledge and experience I can really make a difference over the next four years. With that being said, I think I've made a difference in the last three years being a part of council.”
Looking forward to the next term, Desjarlais wants to develop more initiatives around mental health in the community. Working as a paramedic, Desjarlais has seen the issue worsen over the years for many different reasons, from finances to family dynamics. He sees working on these programs as both a municipal and provincial matter, he said.
“Advocating and supporting the provincial government in that initiative and that department, I think that will go a long way. But locally, there are some initiatives that we can undertake for mental health.”
If elected, Desjarlais will also be pushing for more land-based recreation programs, taking a deeper look at the budget and applying for grants and funding to do so.
Kevin Favel
Kevin Favel put his name on the ballot after being approached by some peers about becoming a voice on the village council, he says.
The drugs, poverty, and crime problems in Île-à-la-Crosse all go hand in hand, he said, they are seeing more and more of that disease spread throughout the community and suicide and mental health are more of a worry for the community than the pandemic.
We need to find solutions, he said, because current treatments fall pretty short of helping people in the community, including young people.
“I've been involved in hockey my whole life as coaching and in terms of starting up my own hockey team and stuff. I’d like to fight for an all-season hockey rink for the kids here, some kind of joint facility in order to keep them busy and keep them off the streets and safe.”
Favel was born and raised in Île-à-la-Crosse and feels he can be that strong voice for his community.
“I can push for the issues that are plaguing our town here...We need that strong voice and I really feel like I can be that person to make all these issues come forward.”
Boone Laliberte
Boone Laliberte will have his name on the ballot for this year’s municipal election because he wants to see more programs for the youth of his community.
He would like to see more long term plans for sports programs, including a hockey league with other communities. Kids need things to keep them off the streets, he said.
Mental health and suicide rates are not just impacting Île-à-la-Crosse, but surrounding communities as well, he said. He would like to see how people can band together to deal with it.
Laliberte is proud to live all his life in the second oldest communities in the province, he said and was an avid volunteer at the local skating rink.
Myra Malboeuf
This could potentially be Myra Malboeuf’s fourth term at the table in Île-à-la-Crosse and wants to continue to help lead the community, she said.
Malboeuf played a major role in the COVID response for Île-à-la-Crosse and is proud about how people stepped up to safely get food, supplies, and personal protective equipment to those in need once or twice a month.
This has also been the year that saw the start of the community centre rebuild, Malboeuf said, which she is proud to be a part of. Through capital funding and the Municipal Economic Enhancement Program grant, the community was finally able to address concerns with the building.
Malboeuf is hoping to keep addressing similar infrastructure issues next term, as well as growing the local economy and continuing to manage tax rates.
Developing and maintaining partnerships in the region has also been an important part of Malboeuf’s time with council, she said.
“Every community has issues with drugs, alcohol, detox and treatment, mental issues. Those have always been on the table and we'll continue to find ways to help our people in those areas.”
Malboeuf has lived in Île-à-la-Crosse all her life and has spent 20 years with the Île-à-la-Crosse Friendship Centre.
Noel McLean
Noel McLean is a new name on the ballot this year for Île-à-la-Crosse. He is running because he believes more needs to be done for the youth of his community, especially now during the pandemic.
McLean runs a local towing business in Île-à-la-Crosse and works for Cameco. He has also been on the recreation board and worked as a volunteer security organizer, and he wants to bring that knowledge he gained from those positions to the council table.
Connections he has made in the community has allowed him to act on some of his goals for Île-à-la-Crosse. By sponsoring local children so they have a chance to play hockey, McLean said he is giving kids something that was difficult for him as a child growing up in the community.
“It was hard for us when we were young to get those hockey fees paid for unless parents paid for it. We're just giving back to the community.”
Looking into the next term, McLean wants to help build a community strategy that will influence future planning within the community. Île-à-la-Crosse council needs to know where the community is going and how to get there, he said.
“This includes bringing a dialogue with the people in the community, knowing where we stand, and how far we're gonna take to get there, because right now I don't see that happening.”
Gerald Roy
After 14 years on the municipal council, Gerald Roy still has a lot to give the community of Île-à-la-Crosse, he said,adding he wants to continue to move the community in a positive and productive direction.
“I've always been a very strong advocate with regards to my community and its health, safety, and well-being. And there's a lot of projects we need to continue to work on. I just feel like I can continue to contribute.”
One of the goals he has for the upcoming term is the hiring and training of a community safety officer, something he has been working towards for the past several years, he said.
“We can find the resources to employ that type of a position because that person will work with the local RCMP and Community Safety Board and can also enforce some of our community bylaws.”
Roy also wants to be on council to work on infrastructure projects. Over the next several years, he said, there will be 7.5 kilometres of ductile water sewer piping.
“We're on a peninsula and we have to put those lines below the frost line. The type of material that's under there is corroding the existing pipelines, which were put in the ’70s. So that amount is going to be about $19.5 million.”
Other goals for Roy will include a regional landfill project, recycling, road work and getting council meetings broadcasted live on local television.
