Yellowknife election 2026: Ryan Fequet interview

Ryan Fequet is running for a second term on Yellowknife’s City Council, saying service levels and “thoughtful development” are issues close to his heart.

Fequet has lived in Yellowknife since 2007 and is the executive director of the Wek’èezhìi Land and Water Board.

He said he decided to run again because there is a lot of work started by the outgoing council that needs to be finished. He also wants to continue pushing for the city to assign service levels to services it offers so when the council decides the budget, that can be a “systematic conversation.”

Fequet said the newly elected council will be tested shortly into its term should the GNWT approve Yellowknife’s new community plan. They will have to decide whether to pass it with or without changes, or scrap it and start over.

His other priority if re-elected would be thoughtful development, making sure the city is considering all the options for development and infill while preserving green spaces.

“There’s a lot of different opportunities we have, not just the Frame Lake West and all this military investment coming, but we can do things in an order so that the areas that are currently used – green spaces or parks – shouldn’t be the first things that are on the chopping block,” said Fequet.

Cabin Radio is aiming to interview all 21 candidates running for eight council seats. We have asked every candidate to list their four top priorities to guide those interviews.

Melissa Syer and Garett Cochrane are running for mayor. Cabin Radio hosted a mayoral candidates’ debate on October 5 at City Hall. You can watch the debate on Cabin Radio’s Facebook page or listen to it on Spotify.

Election day is October 19. Early voting began on October 5 and runs until October 16.

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This interview was recorded on October 6, 2026. The transcript has been edited for clarity and length.

Miriam Bosiljevac: Why do you want to be a city councillor again?

Ryan Fequet: My colleagues and I on the current council put in a lot of time and energy investing in advancing really important initiatives like housing, reconciliation, asset management, climate resilience and our community vision of long-term growth. So there’s a lot of work to finish.

We hit the ground running. All of that sunk cost of learning how council works, the budget process, the files, our council procedures and all those things that may get tricky to dive right in, it’s definitely easier for a returning councillor. I feel I can make an even bigger impact this time around because I’m up to speed.

I also recognize that I’m privileged in my capacity to be able to serve. So I want to be able to step forward and be a leader for the community to make sure it’s safe, accessible and a great place to live for everybody.

Looking back at your leave of absence from city council, what do you feel you learned from that experience?

Same lesson I think I’ve learned on a bunch of different hard topics in council. That particular scenario was my partner and I decided to take a leave from our day jobs and knew that we were going to be spending some of that time outside Yellowknife. At the time, the current council procedure bylaw really only required a councillor to be there once every third council meeting, which would have meant once every six weeks. I wanted to be transparent about my intent to continue participating, but virtually in some cases, and understanding that the city didn’t have any policies or provisions to govern any type of leave for councillors was a really big gap.

In the end, it turned out we were able to create a policy to help clarify expectations for all councillors and the mayor moving forward, ultimately with the goal of trying to make someone putting their name forward and being willing to serve more enticing. Because there’s a lot of great people in our community and a lot of people don’t have time or are just not comfortable, and they recognize that there’s a lot of online anger these days. So we have to do everything we can as the current council to make it enticing and attract really good candidates to step forward and serve.

The current policy we now have makes sure the mayor is receiving sick leave, it makes sure there are provisions for parental leave or compassionate leave, things that just didn’t exist before. Hopefully that will result in people understanding those expectations and feeling more comfortable running, regardless of the life situations they might be going through.

One of your priorities is thoughtful development. What do you see as the key part of this issue?

We’re in a pretty dire situation. People see all these empty lots around town and are wondering why we’re not developing, why are we considering infill, and why are we considering other green spaces when there seem to be empty brownfield lots available. A vacant land tax classification was recently added and a derelicts building bylaw was recently approved. Both of these are meant to be the sticks, the disincentives to help move those properties. People [who are getting] a tax write-off for not developing it now, it’s going to cost them. So they’re going to have to really decide if they want to develop it. Do they want to sell it to somebody else who’s itching to develop those places?

Council also approved the corresponding carrot, which was the development incentives bylaw. That was promoting things like secondary suites and anything that can help our housing situation.

Thoughtful development is really meant to capture the fact there are a lot of different opportunities we have, not just Frame Lake West and all this military investment coming. We can do things so the areas currently used as green spaces or parks shouldn’t be the first things on the chopping block.

Frame Lake West is the first big development opportunity we’re going to have in over 10 years. Development and green space don’t have to be mutually exclusive. There’s lots of cities around the world doing this in a way that you can keep both.

If the GNWT decides to approve the community plan, this will probably be the most important TSN turning point for the next council, because it will have to decide: does it not want to approve that community plan and start over? Or does it not want to approve the plan and do some quick course corrections that are maybe more impactful? Or does it want to approve the community plan knowing there was some progress made on things like mixed-use neighbourhoods and worker accommodations that are also really important in meeting the moment, and dive right into the zoning bylaw?

That will be an interesting negotiation of the next council because it’s going to have to decide where it wants to spend its time and how much time it’s willing to wait, and what risk it’s willing to accept in potentially missing opportunities.

How do you see city council supporting residents with their cost of living?

Cost of living for who is the first question I would ask. There are more vulnerable residents within our community that maybe need more support. This is part of the reason why the current council reduced the transit fees from $3 to $2. It made it free for kids up to 12 years old. We made the walking track free.

One of the big first initiatives of this current council was also increasing the income threshold for our Access for All program, which provides free recreation and transit for low-income families, by $20,000.

One reason I ran for council in 2022 is we do not have a full slate of clearly defined service levels.

When it comes to the budget process, councillors are really negotiating the things they’re either very passionate about or are not very passionate about, and services, programs and initiatives are getting shelved or getting added. That’s not the way it should be done. There’s no clarity on what the value proposition is for residents.

If we can define those service levels and communicate them, and people understand with respect to snow clearing or park maintenance or customer service response times – whatever the service level is we’re talking about – we can have a systematic conversation about where to allocate our resources.

Talking about cutting programs or finding ways to trim the fat is absolutely possible, but we have to define those levels we’re going to ratchet down or ratchet up. Service levels was one of my five goals from the last council that we didn’t make a lot of progress on. That’s what’s motivated me to put my name forward again.

You also wanted to talk about spaces for all. What does this mean to you?

There are lots of physical spaces around our community – a place you go or how you get there – and I was thinking about our accessibility committee and all the accessibility audit recommendations we have been continually implementing for the last four years. People have probably noticed the paving, the basketball nets and some of the trails being upgraded and some of the facilities, making sure they have the button to open the doors.

One of the biggest ones we hear about is seniors and mobility-challenged folks traversing the snow. We only have required snow clearing downtown, and that’s something this current council discussed – whether that bylaw should be expanded to the whole city. While I recognize that might come with an enforcement cost, there are different ways to do that.

The Livery Licence Bylaw was updated to make sure taxis are safer. There’s cameras in them. There’s an accessible taxi available 24/7. There was the approval of two additional municipal enforcement officers focused solely on the downtown. The city is the delivery agent for the federal government’s Reaching Home program, and a lot of those funds are directed to not-for-profits on the ground delivering services like the Line Drive outreach program and the foot patrol downtown. All of these things contribute to accessibility in different ways. Even our new website for example, having information accessible.

That’s what I’m talking about. I think we can have it all. We can have our green spaces, our blue spaces, development, and safe spaces for everybody. We just have to take the time we need to make those decisions thoughtfully.

Note: The Livery Licence Bylaw was recently replaced by the Taxi Bylaw.

If you’re elected, what would be one of the first things you would work on for this specific issue?

We recognize the library is not a safe space currently. It offers amazing programming for families and residents, and the city has already made provisions to look for another location for that facility. I think that’s important.

There’s a snow clearing study happening right now, trying to figure out how to optimize that.

What do you see as the future of effective city governance?

There are three key areas we still have to do work in.

One is making sure residents continue to be engaged in a meaningful way on really important issues where their input is critical. The current council required that administration include substantive, intense engagement on the water rate review, on the field turf at the fieldhouse, on the community plan, on the master transportation plan. Now there are engagement guidelines that help clarify this moving forward. Making sure meetings are at the right times, or are accessible. We need to make sure the city is accessible in the way it governs.

We just stood up and established the major project secretariat to make sure there’s capacity to take advantage of these opportunities that are coming with all the federal funding. Council’s oversight of that will be really important, to make sure we don’t take any unnecessary risks.

Why should people vote for you?

Having a mix of continuing and new councillors is really important.

I think my experience in governance and strategy is really important for decisions coming up that are going to have very long-term impacts. My conflict resolution education and experience is also quite suited to municipal politics these days. You have to maintain an effective working relationship and you have to be able to come to consensus on really important issues after a contentious vote or a spicy topic.

For almost 20 years, I’ve volunteered with lots of different organizations. I think I have a very good sense of what those organizations need to be successful. They’re key partners for the city and the city can’t do everything itself. It needs the territorial and the federal government, and it needs its partners on the ground.