After reports of incomplete funding applications and financial issues forcing its cancellation, the Foster Family Coalition’s Camp Connections is back. The first round of campers arrived on Monday.
Camp Connections is an annual camp operating since 2003 that hosts hundreds of kids at a campsite along the Ingraham Trail.
The camp – geared toward youth in social services, including foster care, adoption or other involvement with the child welfare system – provides young people with outdoor programming and opportunities for “connection, healing, and personal growth.”
In May, organizer the Foster Family Coalition announced its camp wouldn’t operate this year, citing changes to territorial funding models and a need for budget increases.
The NWT government later said the Foster Family Coalition had failed to complete an application to the Anti-Poverty Fund, which ordinarily provides resources to run the camp.
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Made aware of the camp’s cancellation, the NWT’s Department of Health and Social Services had said it would contact the coalition to “better understand what options may be available.”
In mid-June, the coalition announced the camp would in fact return this summer. What changed wasn’t made clear.
On Wednesday, the Department of Health and Social Services told Cabin Radio its funding contract with the coalition “does not include costs for Camp Connections” and the department “did not provide FFC with any additional funding to re-establish Camp Connections in 2026.”
Multiple attempts to interview representatives of the coalition about the camp’s return were unsuccessful.
A reporter who attended the coalition’s Yellowknife office was turned away.
