Councillors in Rankin Inlet, Nunavut, pledge sobriety before Christmas

Hamlet councillors in Rankin Inlet, Nunavut, say they hope to set an example for their community by pledging not to touch alcohol until Christmas.

The pledge of sobriety, passed unanimously in early December, applied to the 12 days leading up to Dec. 25. It came amid ongoing concerns about the community's beer and wine store, which opened in 2021.

"It is our sincere hope that others in the community would join us," said Coun. Chris Eccles, who noted that the hamlet has seen a "dramatic increase" in alcohol consumption since the beer and wine store opened.

"Families and frontline workers have taken the brunt of this harm.... We realize that choosing to drink or not to drink is a choice that only an individual can make, but the community always feels the effects of that choice."

The beer and wine store in Rankin Inlet is one of two such stores in Nunavut and is operated by the territorial government. The territory's other 23 communities have various alcohol regulations in place, with some prohibiting it entirely.

In August, nearly 200 residents of Rankin Inlet signed a petition to have the beer and wine store shut down.

Art Sateana, who is in his first term on hamlet council and one of the youngest elected members, said he feels a great responsibility as a young person on council. The pledge, he said, is an effort to "lead by example."

"I'm very excited for the challenge. I'm excited to see who else might be joining us," he said.

Sateana said the beer and wine store is new enough that people are still adjusting to having it in the community and learning how to use it in moderation.

"It's been a pretty tough transition," he said. "I think it's really important that we take this initiative amongst ourselves [as councillors] to show everybody that if we're going to be able to do it, then they can do it as well."

Art Sateana was recently elected to hamlet council and said he feels a responsibility to lead by example. (Art Sateana)

'Put our money where our mouth is'

Eccles said the council has taken other steps to address the effects of the store as well, including asking the Nunavut government to reduce how much alcohol people are allowed to purchase at a time to two bottles of wine or a case of beer, or a combination of the two. Store hours have also been reduced.

He said council has heard from many frontline workers about how overwhelmed the system is, and has had presentations from nurses who told them that about 80 per cent of after-hours calls to the health centre are related to alcohol. They've heard from police, public housing officials and more about alcohol-related issues.

As the council tried to figure out how to address these issues, they held a closed-door meeting to have a "very open and honest" conversation about how alcohol has affected them personally, Eccles said.

"There weren't a lot of happy endings to a lot of those stories," he said.

"What we said is, you know, we'll lead by example — if we can't change the nine of us in that room, how do you expect the whole community to change? So we put our money where our mouth is and said we should change ourselves first."