Mahsi cho, Mr. Speaker. In the 1990s a survey of runway issues across the North identified Trout Lake as being one of the 11 airports that needs major upgrades to ensure safe operations. It was later determined that the runway itself needed to be relocated.
Trout Lake is a community without an all-weather road access. Its airport is a community lifeline. The Trout Lake Airport Relocation Project is still unfinished and still on our books. The community wants to see this project completed in spite of the difficulties it has experienced. Right now the Department of Transportation is in charge of the project and previously wanted to hire contractors from outside the community and region to do the work, and still may want to. This is nothing that I as the MLA for Trout Lake can or will ever support.
This is Trout Lake’s airport, and opportunities related to this major undertaking should belong to the community and the region. Someone from Trout Lake should be working with DOT to select an appropriate contractor, if not from the community then at least from the region. There are plenty of willing contractors in Fort Simpson and Fort Liard.
Trout Lake needs this continued opportunity. There is equipment in the community and a willing workforce of men and women. It is a chance for the local development corporation to develop much needed capacity that could assist in future projects not only in Trout Lake but other communities in the region. There are already good examples of other small communities that have worked successfully with the Department of Transportation airports division to complete their much needed infrastructure projects.
We all agree that safety of our people and the aircraft is a priority. We need to put past arguments behind us and get this project off the ground. We need a win-win situation and a good-news story for major infrastructure construction in this territory.
Thank you, Mr. Menicoche. The honourable Member for Sahtu, Mr. Yakeleya.
