Enterprise to hold December election with voting rules that irk some

The hamlet of Enterprise, currently under administration, will hold an election to restore a council on December 8 – but some residents say voter eligibility rules exclude people still displaced by 2023’s wildfire.

In May, the NWT’s Department of Municipal and Community Affairs announced it was dissolving Enterprise’s mayor and council and appointing Grant Hood, a former senior administrator of Inuvik, to manage the hamlet.

At the time, some residents – including the hamlet’s former mayor – described a “rift” developing in the community between insured and uninsured property owners since a wildfire burned much of the municipality in August 2023.

The hamlet endured upheaval in 2024 as multiple councillors resigned, a new mayor lasted just four months and Enterprise’s senior administrator left the role.

In an interview with Cabin Radio in August this year, Hood said there was “a strong sentiment” in the community that Enterprise needed more time under administration before a mayor and council should be elected.

One current resident of Enterprise and another who moved elsewhere after their home burned but maintained strong ties – each requesting anonymity to discuss the aftermath of the fire – said they felt December was too soon for the hamlet to move out of administration.

They told Cabin Radio the community needs more time to heal from the devastation the fire brought and the political upset that ensued.

Reached on Friday, Hood said Maca decided to put Enterprise under administration because of certain issues that have now been addressed under his direction. With that work nearly complete, he said, the department is required to return Enterprise to its previous governance model.

A newsletter circulated by Maca to Enterprise residents in late September stated that it was always the department’s intention to return the community’s operations to a democratically elected government “as soon as the challenges that were impacting council’s ability to govern were addressed.”

“Financial reporting is now on track to be completed, changes to the hamlet’s council structure have been made, and a strategic roadmap has been developed to help future councils and administration staff,” the newsletter said.

“In many ways, Maca’s hands were tied,” said Hood. He said the relevant legislation dictates that once the department’s stated goals are achieved through its administrator, “you have to then come out.”

A supervisor will be implemented to help the new council become more familiar with their roles during the transition period, the bulletin said.

“The supervisor will act as a mentor for council to ensure they have all of the tools and resources they need to succeed,” read the newsletter.

Hood said it hasn’t yet been decided if he will continue working with the community as the supervisor, or if the role will be filled by someone else.

Many may be ineligible to vote

To be eligible to vote in the coming election, the Local Authorities Elections Act states, voters must have been a resident of the electoral district for 12 consecutive months leading up to the election – as well as meeting other criteria, such as having turned 18 years of age and being a Canadian citizen.

In an email to Cabin Radio, a Maca spokesperson confirmed that to vote in the election on December 8, those looking to cast a ballot are required to have been living in Enterprise as of December 7, 2024.

In order to prove residency, returning officer Glennis Poitras said, voters are required to provide a utility bill such as for water or power – photo identification that includes an Enterprise address would be insufficient.

Poitras said this directive came from Elections NWT through Maca. Residents who spoke with Cabin Radio said this requirement was also communicated to them at a community meeting organized by Maca earlier this month.

In an email to Cabin Radio, a spokesperson for Maca said the department recommended that Enterprise residents provide proof of residency when registering to vote by using a water or power bill that shows usage.

“This is only an example of documentation that could qualify as proof of residency according to the Local Authorities Elections Act,” said the spokesperson, directing any additional questions about documentation required to vote to the returning officer.

The act describes a person’s place of ordinary residence as a “place that he or she has adopted as his or her home, or the dwelling place to which, when the person is absent, he or she intends to return.”

It stipulates that anyone who leaves the electoral district for more than six months to study, to receive medical treatment, or because they are incarcerated does not lose their place of ordinary residence if – while they’re away – they indicate a clear intention to return, or they return promptly after the circumstances that took them away have concluded.

Currently, there are no provisions for people displaced for extended periods by natural disasters.

Utility bills are not listed as a mechanism to prove ordinary residence.

Residents told Cabin Radio the requirements to vote as outlined to them would exclude roughly half the people who called Enterprise their home before the fire in 2023, since many had no choice but to move away when their homes burned and haven’t yet been able to rebuild.

One former resident, who moved elsewhere after the blaze but who continues to own land in Enterprise, said the requirement amounts to a double standard, since the hamlet itself hasn’t yet rebuilt pieces of infrastructure it lost, such as a six-bay garage used by the public works department.

“It doesn’t make sense to me how they haven’t even started building on the hamlet property, but [they’re] expecting residents to be building on their property and be residing on their property,” said the landowner.

Hood said these are unfortunate circumstances for which there is no appropriate alternative.

“The big question is: how long do you wait? If you wait a year it doesn’t help, because a lot of those people that aren’t eligible this year – unless they can get their house built by December – wouldn’t be able participate if they had the election next year,” Hood explained.

He said Maca looked to municipalities in other parts of Canada that had also been severely impacted by wildfires such as Jasper and Slave Lake, Alberta. He said those municipalities returned to their regular election schedule, and voter eligibility rules, regardless of the number of people who returned after the fire.

The landowner said people who lost their homes in the fire should have been given prior notice that they would be excluded from this election if they didn’t have their utilities hooked up by December last year.

“I also know of another resident who has been on his property at that time. However, he did not have a water bill because he was still in the process of getting a sewer tank installed,” they explained. “They’re telling him he can’t vote because he didn’t have a water bill.”

The landowner said this treatment shows a lack of empathy for those who lost their homes in 2023 – an approach they said had been apparent in other aspects of the recovery process, too.

“I haven’t received one phone call from Maca or from the Hamlet of Enterprise asking me, ‘Hey, are you planning on coming back? Do you want to come back? What kind of help do you think you need, or what can we do to help you?’ There’s absolutely no phone calls, no letters, no nothing,” they said.

They said they continue to receive phone calls from the Red Cross every few months to check in and ask if they need any help. In one such phone call, they offered financial assistance to purchase a new property outside Enterprise.

“We did not choose to leave our house,” the landowner said.

“We lost our homes, [we were] relocated, and the Hamlet of Enterprise are kind-of treating us like, ‘Oh, you guys don’t belong here any more.'”