David Krutko

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Mr. Chairman, we will be allocating an economic rent for that unit the individual is in. So the individual will now have to go to ECE to get the subsidy, which will determine what that rate is. From there, ECE will pay the rent for that senior.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. With regard to the programs that we do have, we have devolved over a period of time. I think a lot of the programs we do deliver, we are delivering on behalf of CMHC which are federal programs. We see a lot of our program dollars from CMHC such as emergency repair funding, EDAP funding and access funding. Because we are an agency that delivers program dollars, we have to follow the national standards. Because the standards we fall under, it may not look like we are being fair, but, in most cases, the programs we do deliver are for people who are at the lower end of...

I would just like to clarify the Member’s numbers. There is no $290 million. We are talking about $90 million from the Government of the Northwest Territories, $90 million from the federal government and being able to sell out a portion of those units to generate $230 million. I don’t know where the $290 million number comes from that the Member is throwing around. Again, it will have to be worked out by way of planning and good planning in order for us to be able to deliver this. The cost to the Government of the Northwest Territories is $90 million, which will be matched by the federal...

Thank you, Madam Chair. Madam Chair, as you know from the budget, we are approving the $38 million and that money will be expended on the delivery of the 185 units. Yes, there may be a delay in delivery because already the winter road access and whatnot. There will be delays. There's our mandate change that will possibly cause some delays. We have land issues we have to deal with. So there will be technical delays through the process. We are still committed to meet the goal where the motion passed in this House to deliver the housing needs to bring down our core needs by 2007. How we...

Thank you, Mr. Chair. Mr. Chair, the simple answer is that the funding we are asking for is in future funding, which is 2011-2012, because we are not sure who the government is going to be of the day, and that this government could not make commitments to future obligations, similar to this Legislature here. CMHC does have our proposal which has been given to them. They are pretty receptive to the proposal. Again, it is based on the approval of future governments to continue the lobby, continue to keep them aware of our proposal and see where that goes. Right now, because of the future...

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Mr. Chairman, what I was stating is that now the elder, whoever’s in social housing, will have to go to income support to get verification in regards to the amount of subsidies they will receive by way of the new social income program that’s going to be managed through Education, Culture and Employment. So they will determine how many subsidies they do receive and exactly how that would be determined. From there, then we basically just charge what the amount of the economic rate is going to be for that unit to the Department of Education, Culture and Employment.

Thank you, Madam Chair. I’d like to thank Mr. Ramsay for his questions. I definitely support the Member in regard to his request that we do look at more multi-constructed facilities, because it does cost us less to operate and you are able to house more people. We have made a decision that the 75 units that we’re looking at replacing in public housing are going to be multi-constructed facilities. They won’t be single dwellings. We are shifting away from that. So the 75 units that are identified to replace public housing will be multi-plex construction. You mentioned six or eight units and...

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Mr. Chairman, we have had quite a few people looking at this. This is not only coming from us. We have people at CMHC, the federal agency that looks at housing in Canada. We have had people from ATCO, ATCO Frontec, and also we have been working with communities to see exactly what lands are going to be available after the pipeline project is over. I believe that the Member is correct; this ain’t going to happen until 2011. We can’t make a commitment here on something that is going to happen possibly in the 17th Legislative Assembly. Because of that, the federal...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, we have been working with the community of Fort Liard. The leadership in the community is in the process of establishing a community housing board to deal with these housing issues, and that will establish an officer to work with the community to take on more of that responsibility. Right now, it is administered pretty well out of Fort Simpson. By doing that, we will devolve more of that authority to that community and allow them to make decisions with housing. We are working with the community leaders, the hamlet, the band council, and also proceeding...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, in regards to Fort Liard, we have had a problem with the Kotaneelee units. We have put $1 million in there to do renovations of the units. We have completed four. We have had meetings with the municipality, the hamlet and the band council for them to conclude the remaining six units. But in this year’s budget, we are looking at allocating five more units into Fort Liard. With that and ongoing funding, we hope to address the housing needs in Fort Liard.