Gov't contractor mistakenly takes man's cars in junkyard cleanup outside Yellowknife

A lengthy court battle to evict a Yellowknives Dene First Nation man and his junkyard outside Yellowknife has come to an end, but the Northwest Territories government may owe that man money thanks to a mistake made during the cleanup of the site earlier this year.

In September 2018, Supreme Court Justice Andrew Mahar ordered a site occupied by Alex Beaulieu since 2003 be transferred to the N.W.T. Department of Lands.

In March, the department hired a contractor to clean up dozens of derelict vehicles, boats, tires, appliances and other refuse that had been abandoned on the site over the years.

According to a court transcript dated March 29, Beaulieu had marked about eight vehicles he intended to keep, and Mahar instructed the government to exempt them from the cleanup.

Instead, the vehicles were taken to Precision Auto to be crushed.

"There's nothing left on that site except the cabin, that's gutted out," said Beaulieu, according to the transcript.

It's a messy development in an equally messy court battle over the piece of land 22 kilometres outside of Yellowknife on Highway 3 that's spanned years.

The original dream

According to court documents, the Yellowknives Dene First Nation band council passed a resolution in 2003 to give Beaulieu permission to live on the site, in conjunction with the Northwest Territories Housing Corporation's Elders on the Land initiative.

The housing corporation gave him a $30,000 forgivable loan to build a cabin, and the Yellowknives Dene First Nation gave him $6,000 to relocate his belongings out there.

Beaulieu said his initial dream was to use the site as a wood-cutting operation.

But he never moved in. About a year later, the Yellowknives Dene Housing Committee was recommending the band council revoke its resolution to allow him to live on the land.

"Since January 2003, he has not resided in this unit," states an email from the committee to the Yellowknives Dene First Nation chief in 2004.

"He has instead illegally occupied a house in Ndilo. He has collected various materials in and around this house. He has turned this house and yard into a garbage dump in the middle of the Ndilo community."

Although he was occupying the land at the time in contravention of the agreements he had with the First Nation and the housing corporation, Beaulieu maintains in court documents that he still intended to fulfill his vision for the site.

He says those dreams literally came crashing down around him on June 1, 2005, when a construction company blasted along Highway 3.

Before blasting, NWT Rock Services offered to either temporarily relocate Beaulieu's cabin out of harm's way, or pay him $4,000 as a final settlement for any damages that might occur from the blasting. He opted for option two.

"It doesn't constitute blowing my whole life away," he said during court proceedings in September 2018.

Rocks flew through the roof of his cabin, destroyed a teepee he had built, and crushed a number of his vehicles.

"I had just bought a 1968 Ford F-100 for $100 and was going to fix it up," he said. "That got blasted away too."

Beaulieu said he never used the site again after the blast, yet cars and appliances continued to accumulate there over the years.

In 2008, the first year Beaulieu says he received a trespassing notice about the property, the federal government inspected the site and found 35 abandoned cars.

In 2010, that number had increased to 49. By 2017, there were 72 abandoned cars on the property.

'A mistake has been made'

During court proceedings, Beaulieu denied ownership of a bulk of the cars and appliances on the site, but said he still planned to fix up about eight vehicles that were sitting out there. He also said he planned to reclaim two boats and various other belongings, but wasn't given the chance to before the site was cleaned up.

"A mistake has been made, not an intentional breach, but a mistake has been made, and there should be some compensation for that mistake," said Mahar during the March 29 sitting.

Beaulieu will return to court on July 12 in an effort to come to an agreement with the Department of Lands over what he believes he's owed. But Beaulieu made it clear in court that he believes he's owed a lot.

"Everything's been lost," said Beaulieu. "My whole life's been lost."