Promised road never built, northerners complain

Four years after the provincial government promised to start building an all-weather road to a northern Saskatchewan community, a delegation from the Hatchet Lake First Nation is in Regina asking why the road has yet to materialize.

Bart Tsannie, chief of the Hatchet Lake First Nation, said people were looking forward to improved access to the south.

"It's a frustration," Tsannie said. "You know, it's been promised to us, the road. But now we have to lobby because as I said it's very important for us to have a road."

The government said that after the promise was made other priorities have needed funds.

"When I look at it from our perspective we've put a record amount of money into highways," Don McMorris, the minister of highways said Friday. "And there's more needed and more wanted all the time."

Currently people travel to the Wollaston Lake area by boat in the summer, ice road in the winter — or they fly.  

The chief notes it means supplies are extremely expensive for community members.

According to Tsannie, the boat trip takes about three hours each way.

The ice-road route takes even longer and has other things to worry about.

"We have some mild winters now," he said. "It's dangerous to travel on ice."

Two winters ago, a teacher from the community died after falling through the ice road.

The government could not say when, or if, an all-weather road to Wollaston will be built.

According to a 2008 news release, issued by the then-minister of highways Wayne Elhard, the province was ready to spend $700,000 on the initial work for construction of a new link to the north.

"When this all-weather road is complete, it will provide local residents with the same opportunities for economic growth and social activities as citizens in the rest of Saskatchewan," the news release said.