Highlights of History from The Whitehorse Star

Published by The Whitehorse Star on December 31, 2002.

Dateline: May 19, 2024.

    Choosing the Yukon's top 10 stories of the year is, to a large extent, an arbitrary task. It's a mixture of our judgment, of the stories which have attracted considerable media coverage, or those with the most significant effects on the largest number of Yukoners.

    Here, then, are the Star's top 10 stories of 2002.

1

    On Nov. 4, the day after an earthquake rocks parts of Alaska and the Yukon, territorial politics experience a tremblor of their own. The government headed by Pat Duncan and her Liberals is decimated in the territorial election. Only she survives to face a Yukon Party government led by Dennis Fentie, who had defected from the New Democrats during the spring. The Liberals' dissolution had begun on Jan. 11, when Duncan dismissed ministers Don Roberts and Wayne Jim from her cabinet. Joined by Mike McLarnon, the duo left the Liberal caucus April 2, paring the government to a minority.

2

    The territory takes a historic step in its political evolution March 27 when the Yukon Act is given royal assent in Ottawa. The legislation entrenches responsible government in the territory's constitution. It also authorizes the transfer of important federal powers, such as control of land and water, to the Yukon on April 1, 2003. Previously, the Kaska Nation and the Carcross-Tagish First Nation had told a Senate committee they were concerned devolution would interfere with their land claims, since they negotiate with Ottawa but the Yukon government will control the land.

3

    Whitehorse clinches the 2007 Canada Winter Games after the federal government confirms May 29 it will provide $20 million for the sporting spectacle. It will the first time since the games' 1967 inception that they'll be staged north of 60. The new multiplex will include two arenas and a gym. The aquatic centre opened in the fall. An estimated 6,000 volunteers will be participating in the games.

4

    Northwestel Inc. workers end a two-month strike July 21 after ratifying a new contract. The 380 workers across the North vote 74 per cent in favour of the new deal, which gives them a 13.5 per cent raise over three years. Going into the strike, which began May 27, the workers were earning, on average, $21.90 per hour. Management personnel filled in during the dispute.

5

    Tara Christie, the president of the Klondike Placer Miners Association, describes herself as "shocked" after the federal government announces a new regulatory regime Dec. 16. Ottawa will scrap the nine-year-old Yukon Placer Authorization at the end of 2003 and phase in more stri water quality guidelines. While territorial Mines Minister Archie Lang promises a vigorous fight against the Department of Fisheries and Oceans' plans, the Yukon Conservation Society and Yukon Salmon Committee welcome the plan.

6

    City councillor Samson Hartland finds himself alienated from council for comments he makes after the city mistakenly demolishes the heritage Sewell house on the waterfront in May. Hartland portrays the destruction as a conspiracy. Territorial ombudsman Hank Moorlag releases his $20,000 report into Hartland's comments Aug. 5, finding no conspiracy. Mayor Ernie Bourassa asks Hartland to resign from council, but the latter refuses, saying he wants to put the matter behind him.

7

    Air North begins regular Boeing 737 service from Whitehorse to Vancouver, Calgary and Edmonton in early June. Before the summer is out, it launches a complaint to a territorial committee about rival Air Canada's marketing tactics, which Air North believes are out to foil competition. In August, Infrastructure Minister Scott Kent says he's unhappy with the number of Air North tickets being bought for government travel.

8

    Sue Edelman, minister responsible for the Women's Directorate, offers to resign from that portfolio in early April after an inflammatory e-mail she wrote to cabinet staff in March is made public. The minister called some women's groups "extremist" and femi-Nazis". Maureen Stephens, co-chair of the Public Service Alliance of Canada's regional women's committee, says she's "shocked and disappointed" by Edelman's assessments. However, the minister's comments attract streams of supportive letters to the Star, mainly from people living Outside.

9

    Whitehorse resident Marcellus Jacob is sentenced Feb. 27 for one of the most vicious sexual assaults the territory has witnessed in memory. Jacob raped, sodomized and tortured a Whitehorse woman at knifepoint for five hours after he broke into her home in July 2001. Territorial court Judge Barry Stuart calls the 21-year-old's crime savage, brutal and horrific. Had Jacob not been the victim of abuse and neglect in his childhood, the judge told him, his sentence would have exceeded 10 years.

10

    The Yukon Court of Appeal releases a decision Dec. 13 that Whitehorse physician Allon Reddoch and Whitehorse General Hospital did not neglect 16-year-old Mary-Ann Grennan when she was admitted to the hospital for treatment in 1995. She and her father had become ill after having eaten smoked fish. She died of botulism on April 28, 1996. The court ruling overturned a previous trial verdict that the doctor and the hospital had neglected the teenager's care.