Caroline Cochrane

Yes. Thank you, Mr. Chair. We are in agreement that we do provide some programs that maybe we shouldn’t be. That is part of the survey and trying to see, again, which programs are still relevant or not, being conscious, though, that right now, with just trying to address the amount of people that are paying more than 30 per cent of their income to the cost of living or to suitability, to core needs within the community, we are still way behind the gun. We need to be really careful when we restructure programs that we don’t try to make it too broad and that we can address the core needs...

Thank you, Mr. Chair. We look at the stock within the territories and we try to make sure that the stock is actually fairly evenly distributed throughout the communities that we have. Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Thank you, Mr. Chair. The community survey, the community needs, will be funded as they are currently, by the funding provided by the federal government and provided by the GNWT. Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. within the affordability, if a person has a suitable house and adequate house in that the roof doesn’t leak and they have the proper amount of bedrooms, affordability can still become an issue if they are making, for example, making $10.50 an hour, and there’s no other units within the community, so although they have enough bedrooms and the roof doesn’t leak, they are in a unit that they have no option to be in, but they can’t really financially afford to be in. Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Besides the public housing that we have, the things that we specialize specifically for seniors in their communities are, there are things that they can access like the emergency repair. We are really focusing on preventative maintenance with seniors. We’re actually trying to get out of the office, like one of the other Members have said and actually into their homes. We’re making it easier for them to access services. We have programs such as the SAFE program that makes sure that ramps, et cetera are done, CARE Major that they can come and get repairs up to $100,000, such as roofs, ramps...

Thank you, Mr. Chair. First of all, within this current budget, we have committed to setting up three LHOs within the community so we won’t be taking on any more within this current budget. We are more than happy to meet with the communities and see what we can do to best meet their needs. Again, like I had said before, we will be examining other communities within each fiscal budget coming up. The goal is to have LHOs in all communities. Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Thank you, Mr. Chair. We have about 150 people actually taking advantage of the Transitional Rent Supplement Program at this time. Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Thank you, Mr. Chair. Actually, yes, it is federal monies that we received, the $16 million. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Chair. A strategic plan will be developed from the needs surveys in that it will be communitybased. Each community, 33 communities within our region, within our territory, will be identified individually, and then the longterm plan will be to address the needs individually within that community. It’s not a strategic plan that lumps all into one because I don’t believe in onesizefitsall. It will be a strategic plan that identifies within each community what are their goals and then strategically how do we address the goals within those communities. There will be community focus...

Thank you, Mr. Chair. I’m not going to say it’s a really good question, but it is a really good question because I didn’t have any idea either. The first time that an Aboriginal government came to me and said we want culturally appropriate housing in our community, I kind of thought in my head and I said well, I’m sure that doesn’t mean tents and igloos, because we’ve kind of passed that. I asked them what does culturally appropriate mean to you, and examples were given. For example, the IRC had said that within their community, culturally appropriate, they’re hunters, and within their...