The NWT’s Mine Training Society and Tłı̨chǫ Government will spend $1.2 million over three years on a set of programs to connect Yellowknife’s Tłı̨chǫ residents with jobs.
Friday’s announcement of the Tłı̨chǫ Works program marked the latest in a series of initiatives being brought forward to address, among other issues, the impending closure of diamond mines.
The Diavik mine will close early next year, while the Ekati mine appears on increasingly fragile economic footing.
Under Tłı̨chǫ Works, the Mine Training Society will target programming at the 900 or so Tłı̨chǫ citizens estimated by the organizers to live in Yellowknife. The Tłı̨chǫ Government is the funder.
The Mine Training Society stressed the Yellowknife services will be in addition to training programs already provided in the Tłı̨chǫ communities by the Tłı̨chǫ Government.
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The society said assistance in Yellowknife will include hands-on training, career planning, training supports, skill-building sessions and workshops, among other services.
“This partnership is an important step for us and it comes at a time when working together with partners to prepare Tłı̨chǫ citizens for the changing economy is critical,” Tłı̨chǫ Grand Chief Jackson Lafferty was quoted as saying in a news release.
“This project is one of the capacity-building projects we are implementing with funding from Canada for the Giant Mine Remediation Project,” Chief Doreen Arrowmaker of Gamètì told a news conference on Friday.
“Career development officers in the Tłı̨chǫ communities will continue to support our citizens living there, but now the MTS Tłı̨chǫ Works unit will provide similar services to our citizens in Yellowknife.”
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This announcement comes two weeks after the Yellowknives Dene First Nation, Tłı̨chǫ Government and GNWT said they would partner to help residents hit by diamond mine job losses and diversify the economy.
The three governments have launched a central hub for programs that help people affected by mine closures.
More broadly, the governments said they are lobbying Ottawa for “targeted supports for the resource sector” like retraining initiatives, housing investment and infrastructure funding.
Late last month, the Mine Training Society announced a distinct but related program named Sustainable North: Our Workforce – abbreviated to Snow – which is worth more than $8 million and will give nearly 2,000 northerners training to “transition to low-carbon employment.”
The society itself has even considered a name change, given it now has a broader remit than training for mine-related work, though staff say a rebrand is a low priority compared to its other projects.
“We are transitioning into an organization that provides training and employment services to many industries and not just mining,” society board chair Giselle Marion said at Friday’s news conference.
Extra staff have been hired to deliver the various new programs, and the society said news of more initiatives could follow. The new Tłı̨chǫ Works program and its services are available immediately.
Marion is also the Tlicho Government’s director of client services.
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From that perspective, she said, “we’re happy to have extra service delivery here for Yellowknife citizens, as they’ve been asking for a long time to have services catered to them.”
“This is our way of doing a pilot project in the Yellowknife area to see how that will work over the next couple years and see whether it’s a long-term thing to do,” Marion said.
“I’m really excited with this partnership, and I hope it helps our people during this crazy economic time with the mine closure and transitioning into new upskill services that hopefully will fund another economy within Yellowknife.”
