The Reminder is making its archives back to 2003 available on our website. Please note that, due to technical limitations, archive articles are presented without the usual formatting.
The Doer government has a vision to effect positive social and economic change in Northern Manitoba, former Flin Flon MP Rod Murphy told residents Thursday. As guest speaker at the Communities Working Together Celebration at the R.H. Channing Auditorium, he outlined the province's Northern Development Strategy. "What we're trying to do is make sure that the North does have a voice in government," said Murphy, now a senior policy advisor for Transportation and Government Services. Established in September of 2001, the Northern Development Strategy (NDS) consists of dozens of initiatives designed to assist the North in five areas: transportation, health, employment and training, housing and economic development. The strategy includes major projects such as the planned University College of the North and lesser known initiatives such as a dust-control program for communities relying on gravel roads. Clearly enthused about the strategy, Murphy told the crowd, "I don't know if we're ever going to have this opportunity again in the North." Initiatives outlined in the NDS include: establishing the Manitoba Telehealth program to allow northern patients to have access to professionals in the South without leaving their home communities; investment in airport renewal, often with federal assistance; the Adolescent Pregnancy Prevention strategy designed to reduce the number of adolescent pregnancies; See 'Funding' P.# Con't from P.# funding to support the province's air ambulance program; the implementation of a Regional Diabetes Program; addressing the challenge of recruiting and retaining health care professionals in the North; the development of a northern hiring process and an aboriginal employment strategy; the establishment last year of the Northern Development Strategy Fund, which will provide seed money toward a range of natural resource and sustainable development initiatives; working with aboriginal groups to increase participation in the development of Manitoba's mineral resources; and providing support for the Northern Forest Diversification Centre in The Pas to train individuals to earn a living from the forest. Murphy said one of the next steps in the strategy will be to build partnerships with federal and municipal governments, First Nations, northern communities and northern people. "It doesn't make a lot of sense for us to be sitting in Winnipeg and saying, 'This is what we want' if we really haven't talked to people from the North," he said.
