It's taking longer than expected to rebuild the Issatik Co-op in Whale Cove, according to former mayor Stanley Adjuk, who also heads up the local Co-op board of directors.
Adjuk said work at the new store is progressing a lot slower than he anticipated.
He said there's a number of reasons progress has been bogged down.
"First it was the surveyors not being on site and that delayed everything for a bit," said Adjuk. "Then it was a problem with the drill, which is not working right now, so we're waiting for a part just to finish up a few more piles on the ground.
"I don't know about the public, but, yes, the board is getting very impatient with this because we've been stressing this for the past year.
"It's sad to see when construction companies are not working due to waiting for a part."
Given the situation, Adjuk said there's nothing the local board of directors can do to speed up the process.
He said the board is at the mercy of the needed part because there's no other drilling equipment currently available in Whale Cove.
"We have to wait for a part and that means we wait for a part.
"I have no idea how long we'll have to wait. It's been down for a few days now (as of Aug. 27) and we could possibly be waiting for another week."
As the community of close to 500 people waits for construction to resume on the new store, goods are still being sold at the community hall, which was converted into a little store about a year ago and is still operating.
Adjuk said the little operation is holding up nicely.
He said it's small and compact, but it holds what the community needs.
"It's doing as well as can be expected under the circumstances. It will be nice when everything gets back to normal again.
"That's why we've been pushing from our end on the progress going too slow while we wait on a part. And, the more delays we get, the more money it will cost us, so I just hope they finish it on time. We just want to get our store back.
"We're doing pretty good when the freighters are on time, but, when they're delayed by bad weather or whatever, that's when we start to see that we're running out of stuff. And some of the goods are too pricey right now, so we're hoping to see the prices drop on them.
"Prices, pretty much, went up across the board, especially last year when everything was getting flown in. We're starting to see some prices drop, but not much, so we're still working on that. If everything goes according to plan, we're hoping to hold our grand opening this coming April. If we make it in April, we'll have some community square dances to celebrate."
