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The Political Trenches: Local Government At Work · The Political Trenches

Full Interview - NWTAC President Kandis Jameson

March 23, 2026·44 min·1 clip
She evacuated her community three times in 12 months and didn't lose a single person.
The frame is local leadership. Jameson comes in through education work, community service, and a mayoral focus on a healthy, growing Hay River. The talk stays practical. Her time on regional and local education boards is not treated as resume filler. It leads straight into literacy, learning, and whether people have a real shot at opportunity in their own communities. Then the episode turns to crisis. Jameson talks through the emergency material in plain, operational terms: a highway being cleared, dead animals, burnt out cars, and the awful uncertainty of not knowing how people got out. That is where the interview finds its weight. Emergency management stops sounding like a file on someone’s desk and starts sounding like people trying to figure out who is safe. The lighter stretch still has a point. Curling, youth hockey, and territorial representation become ways that communities make room for young people to travel, meet each other, and build connections that may matter later. Jameson ties that back to her own Fort Smith experience and to the people she now sits beside around tables. Relationships are part of the job, not a side benefit. Near the end, Alberta comes into view. Jameson looks toward rural municipalities there with curiosity about shared pressures, differences, and what can be learned. The episode lands on northern local government as close, practical work among communities that need to understand each other.

As heard by us

A steady look at northern municipal leadership as lived work.

Candace Jameson’s path from education and literacy work into municipal leadership in Hay River gives the conversation a clear sense of place and purpose.

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Why you'd press play

Hear how a Hay River mayor talks about leadership when Northwest Territories communities are under significant stress.

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