I hope this is the right place to discuss what's happening locally near you -
Lots of construction here for the new federal wharf - right now they're still unloading the massive barge that brought everything here. This is a six month federal project that will end in October at a cost of I think $37million. Massive amounts of very heavy thick steel are being unloaded this weekend by two huge cranes brought in for that purpose.
A second project is all set - the construction firm is still waiting for final signatures on their contract, namely construction of the road from here to Natashquan, to finally connect the Lower North Shore with mainland Quebec. The project this summer is just for eleven kilometers at $3million per kilometer, although I think the reason the contract is taking so long is because someone feels that's awfully expensive for a gravel road. But that's including the cost of several barges bringing equipment back and forth, and accomodations for a large number of crew. We expect this project will result in 3.5 years of work, just to connect Kegaska to Natashquan. Connecting the rest of the Lower North Shore (Quebec) will take probably ten years. There has been talking of connecting the entire Lower North Shore by road since 1946 and it still hasn't happened.
Finally, the Coast Guard is sending a new fast rescue craft to be based here in Kegaska - and I think it's called a "rollover" type boat, in other words, it can right itself if it tips over in a bad storm. Sounds scary as hell, especially if it rolls all the way over, which I guess is very unlikely to happen.
Local people are also employed to work at the B&B which is housing and feeding to their capacity - about 25 people - and both construction operations are bringing in trailers to accomodate even more workers. I've never seen this much construction in one village anywhere on the coast, and I've lived on the Lower North Shore since 1995.
Each of these three projects include hiring small numbers of folks locally, so our unemployment rate this summer will be close to zero - we're only a population of just over a hundred people! - another source of employment here is the annual Snow Crab fishery which is underway, and the boats are bring back very good catches of crab. There's also much smaller cod, clam, scallop, and lobster fisheries which begin later in the year.