Tsiigehtchic completes switch to hamlet status
The senior administrator of Tsiigehtchic says "a lot of planning" needs to be done ahead of the community's first municipal election for a hamlet mayor and council.
Formerly a Northwest Territories charter community, Tsiigehtchic turned into a hamlet on July 1. Besides a band council, there will now be a separate municipal council.
The shift, years in the making, was cemented when 76 percent of residents voted in favour of the switch last year. A formal order establishing the Hamlet of Tsiigehtchic was issued last week.
"The big change is that Tsiigehtchic residents who are not members of the Gwichya Gwich'in band will now be able to vote for the hamlet mayor and the hamlet council," administrator Grant Scott told Cabin Radio.
In the past, Scott said, the chief elected in any Gwichya Gwich'in band election automatically became the mayor, meaning other residents did not have the opportunity to vote or run for office.
The hamlet's opening election is set to take place on December 9, in line with other N.W.T. hamlets under the territory's Local Authorities Elections Act. Scott will temporarily act as the equivalent of mayor and council until elected officials can be sworn in that month.
The only concern raised at a public meeting about the switch, he said, "was the length of time it took for the hamlet to be created and the length of time it will take to have the first election."
Scott said the Department of Municipal and Community Affairs distributes an election calendar to communities that is "very precise" and informs hamlets about specific tasks to be completed over eight weeks of preparation before election day.
The next step will be appointing a chief returning officer responsible for organizing the election by hiring additional staff, putting out notices, updating the voters list, creating a call for nominations, and making ballots for the election among other things.
"The whole process started several years ago and the first thing that slowed it down was Covid. Then the last territorial election – that slowed things down. There's a certain point when the writ is dropped for a territorial election that ministers have less authority to do things," Scott explained.
"So, we had to wait for the election to happen, ministers to be appointed, and then the briefing of new ministers. It takes a while. It's a process and so we finally made it. We're now a hamlet. The next step is the election."
Aastha Sethi, Local Journalism Initiative Reporter, Cabin Radio
