Caroline Cochrane

Thank you, Mr. Chair. I do appreciate the Member’s comment and correction. It is nine cents per kilowatt hour. I apologize for that. What we are doing to try to address that, as well, is within this fiscal budget, we are looking at increasing it by another six cents per kilowatt hour to make it 15 cents per kilowatt hour, which is still lower than the general population is paying, but promotes independence within the population. There is also a cost savings when the public pays for their power versus the GNWT paying for the power. Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Thank you, Mr. Chair. I’m not too sure what more I can say. The national standard says that it’s one of the three: affordability, suitability or adequacy, and my direction earlier in the House said that I have to work towards those national standards. Unless the House is willing to change the motion then I need to be able to work towards the national standard as defined. Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Thank you, Mr. Chair. Actually, some of our smaller communities actually don’t take as much revenues because the population is small and the amount of unit that we, Public housing, has in there are small too, so we don’t need as much financial resources within those communities to be able to address their needs. Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Thank you, Mr. Chair. First of all, I want to start off with that comment. Because a lot of people, a lot of people actually, believe that every empty, boardedup home within the communities actually belongs to the NWT Housing Corporation, and that is a fallacy. In fact, there are a lot that are actually market houses people have had and they’ve left for other houses. People have left. We do have a listing of every community of all of the empty units that are boarded up that belong to the NWT Housing Corporation, and we can provide that to the committee, as well. Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Yes, we’re doing a pilot with the four-plexes within the communities at this point because we realize that, when we build four-plexes, actually, it’s more energy efficient. We can have, for example, one furnace room that heats all four units. The other really key thing within that is that, in my own personal belief and probably research would back that, is that seniors are very sociable, and so we need to really respect that. We need to keep the brain capacity of seniors going. We can’t isolate them in units that are individual, although we do have some units. The new four-plexes really allow...

Thank you, Mr. Chair. I reinstate that we are committed to trying to get in every community that has the capacity; we are looking to eventually have an LHO office. At this time, in this budget, no, we will not be providing LHOs in the Hay River Reserve. But, yes, I am willing to meet with them and, yes, we will consider it in future years. Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Thank you, Mr. Chair. Affordability is a core need. The Members just moved a motion that the Corporation is to try to work two percent per year to meet the national standards, which are set by CMHC, which address affordability as a core need. Within Yellowknife, the major issue is affordability, and it has a huge need of people that can’t afford. Nationally, the standard is if you’re paying more than 30 per cent of your income for your housing needs, you are in core need. At any point, you’re at risk of being homeless. If we ignore people that have a suitable house in that they have enough...

Thank you, Mr. Chair. How we do the capital acquisition is we consider the following items for priorities in our capital planning. We look at the age of the asset, we focus on units that are over 40 years of age, we look at the condition rating, the operating performance and the community and LHO consultations within that. Then units are considered beyond economic repair if the cost to repair the asset is 70 per cent or more of the cost of replacement. At that time, it makes more sense to build a unit. Most units beyond economic repair are replaced with multi-configured units that we’re...

Thank you, Mr. Chair. The strategic framework that we’re looking at internally for the Housing Corporation will be based on community needs defined within that, and that is to be as culturally appropriate as possible to the different communities within the territories. However, the territorial plan for the federal engagement will be looking at core needs throughout all three territories, and that information will be based off of our 2014 needs assessment which was done across Canada. We’ll be using that tool, as well, to promote the best interests. The federal government, in my opinion, doesn...

Thank you, Mr. Chair. Currently, no. Again, we have just started our fiscal year. The bigger thing is, like I said, within the needs survey that is going out, we will be looking at every single program that the Housing Corporation provides to make sure that they are still meeting the needs and that they are addressing the needs within the communities. Thank you, Mr. Chair.