Mr. Chair, as I stated, I’ve been pushing this issue for 12 years, and we haven’t even got to the gravel pit yet. The priorities of this Assembly are to have sustainable communities, develop our local economies, reduce the cost of living and also to connect in our communities. Most of us in our communities are not asking for a four-lane highway. All we want is a road where two pickups will pass each other in the dark. We don’t care if there are potholes or if there’s permafrost pushing up from underneath as long as we get to drive on something, because we’re used to it up there.

In order to start this, we do have to make an attempt to deal with existing road systems, either our winter roads or expanding our systems. We can’t take it lightly that with global warming in Arctic coastal communities and deltas, with the rising ocean levels, these communities will be threatened. The coastland will be threatened. We have to realize we will not be able to depend on ice roads. We will not depend on serving and providing services to communities unless we deal with that challenge.

It’s not unique to us; we’ve already seen in the last ten years where our winter season for ice roads is shrinking, and we’re basically down to five or six weeks now where before you were down to three months. We’ve got to be realistic that it’s real, that it’s here. Whatever strategy we use, we have to keep in mind that that is an element we have to

build into any of our strategies, build into any of our plans. Again, let’s at least start. You know, I don’t care if it’s a footpath or a four-by-four track. Let’s get something out there so communities can see we are trying something.

We’re not going to build the Taj Mahal. I don’t care if there’s permafrost pushing it up, making the road a little rough. We have to be realistic that most people, you know.... Give them something and they can build from that. We’ve seen that experience in communities that had initiative: the road to communities like Jean Marie and other communities, which started off as a simple community initiative by community access road projects. Now you have a pretty decent road, simply by these community initiatives.

I know we’ve tried different initiatives in the past. Again, I’d just like to point out to the department that we have to build that into whatever strategy. Again, we have to make an attempt to connect our communities to our existing infrastructure or highways. In my case, get me to the gravel pit, and we can go from there.