Caroline Cochrane

Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to provide you with a report on the Government of the Northwest Territories’ progress on meeting its mandate commitments related to housing. Under the priority of cost of living of the 18th Legislative Assembly, this government is committed to continuing to implement northern solutions for northern housing. Addressing homelessness is part of this commitment.

One of the related actions is our support for the Housing First project in Yellowknife. An agreement was signed with the Yellowknife Women’s Society to fund this project in the amount of $450,000 over three years...

As stated earlier in my answers, we are actually just in the process of doing a full review of all services available to seniors, identifying how many seniors, what their needs are, and what the most effective way is to keep them not only in their homes, but comfortable, so that they can be in their homes and age in place. That process is just starting.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. The Northwest Territories Housing Corporation is actually just beginning to do a full study on seniors' needs, not only where they are most populated and where we should be building, but also what exactly they want within those buildings. We will be working with the Department of Health and Social Services because I know they have quite a bit of information. We will be working with the NWT Seniors' Society. We are looking at how better we can serve seniors, not only what their necessities are, but also what their wants are as well. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

My understanding is that the Hay River hospital actually went through the same process and therefore did have to stop construction over the winter months. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

As stated, the projected budget that the Housing Corporation had estimated for the construction of that building was not based on a low bid. It was actually based on a cost analysis that is done for a building within each community that takes that into account. We are hoping that the building will start up again in April and that it will be done as soon as the contractor can do that. However, if the contractor wishes to build over the winter and can promise me that he will be able to do that contract within the negotiated contract price, then I am willing to allow the contractor to move...

As stated earlier, this is an exceptional agreement that we made. This was a negotiated contract. We do set budget amounts when we put buildings out to tender. If we had gone with the normal contract procurement process where the bids are open to the public, then we would expect that the bids would have come in at a more reasonable figure, closer to our projected budget. We did make the exceptions because of the negotiated contract, and so therefore, because of the great discrepancy between the estimated amount and the amount brought forward to us, we had to look at ways that we could actually...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. The nine-plex in Fort McPherson was an interesting process, actually. We did have a contractor originally scheduled to complete it. There were some issues. We had to dissolve that contract. Then I entered into a negotiated contract with a local company, which fit the true definition of negotiated contracts in that it was about building capacity for the contractor and providing in the community, so we were really eager to actually begin that process.

The difficulty was that, in trying to do that negotiated contract, the contractor actually came back at more than double...

Thank you, Mr. Chair. Seven are at the state of partially completed, that there are just a few last touches to do, and then there is a number of them that are actually at various stages of construction. Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Thank you, Mr. Chair. Yes, at this point it is okay for them to use them on construction as long as they are within our business plan and as long as they're still meeting the needs within the population. They can't build and just do some kind of initiative on their own; it has to fit within the model of the Northwest Territories Housing Corporation. Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Thank you, Mr. Chair. Yes, we are not averse to tiny homes. In fact, we have a home that is being designed in Aklavik, actually, in a partnership with the Aboriginal government. They are looking at a onebedroom design that is only 300 square feet but still meets the national building code. We are looking at partnerships with communities if they want to move into that. I am very respectful of communities, and so, hopefully, municipal governments or Aboriginal governments would come to us if they are looking at a tiny home concept, and it would a partnership model versus the Housing Corporation...