Caroline Cochrane

Thank you, Mr. Chair. On my left is Mr. Tom Williams; he's the president of the Northwest Territories Housing Corporation. On my right is Mr. Jim Martin; he is the vice-president of finance and infrastructure services. Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Thank you, Mr. Chair. We are still under contract to deliver those units to Fort Simpson. Thank you, Mr. Chair.

In regards to homelessness, I do recognize that it is a territorial issue. I have known that for a long time, and the MLA is correct. The majority of people actually who are in our capital city are not from the capital. They are from the communities.

To that effect, I have been providing a lot of support. Not only am I funding the Housing First initiative in Yellowknife, we are doing shelters in four communities coming up. We have a homeless shelter coming into Aklavik, one coming into Behchoko, one coming into Fort Simpson, and the newest one is Fort Good Hope. My goal is, like I said at the...

Thank you, Mr. Chair. We are working with the contractor to try to get the units into the communities. At this point, that is what I can say. We are trying to work as hard as we can to actually get the units into the communities as soon as we can. Thank you, Mr. Chair.

I absolutely agree with the statement that it takes more to manage homelessness than it does to address it before people become homeless. That is why the Housing Corporation last year spent $132 million, $70 million coming from the Government of the Northwest Territories, $35 million coming from the federal government, and $30 million actually coming from the low rents for the accommodations that we have. We spend a lot of money to try to deal with not only homelessness, but homelessness is housing, so to deal with housing.

Thank you, Mr. Chair. Right across Canada, most jurisdictions actually have a halt on because of the declining CMHC funding that was announced many years ago, as well. All jurisdictions have been negotiating with the federal government to reverse that decision so that we can get funded for the operating and maintenance of units.

Within those negotiations, the federal government has agreed to put a halt on it temporarily, but that is not a permanent decision by them. That is why I am looking at different initiatives to move more people into home ownership. Through the lease-to-own, we will be...

Thank you, Mr. Chair. All of the new builds actually meet the Energy Guide 80, which is a high standard of energy efficiency. We also partner with CMHC, Canadian Mortgage and Housing Corporation, on any energy efficiency initiatives that they have and we work closely with the Arctic Energy Alliance as well to see if there are areas that we can either support them or use their programs to support residents. Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Thank you, Mr. Chair. The $15 million has been the same for many years, in all honesty. The reality, though, is that the capital is one small piece of the financial allocations that we provide. We provide $15 million, but in total we spend $132 million. A lot of our actual work is done in the operating and maintenance in the mains that come in later. A lot of the work that we do in communities is actually retrofitting; so upgrading and renovating units. Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Thank you, Mr. Chair. Within the last letter that we wrote specific for the Northwest Territories, we did identify that we would need around $100 million to be comparable to the money that was received by the Government of Nunavut. I will take the request back to Cabinet and after Cabinet's decision I will make a decision on whether we can provide the letters and the territorial working relationship with standing committee. Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Thank you, Mr. Chair. In the case of the Yellowknife Housing Authority, they came to us with a proposal. We actually agreed to partner with them in that proposal, and so the Northwest Territories Housing Corporation will be putting in financial contribution towards building the units for singles within this community of Yellowknife. Thank you, Mr. Chair.