Robert C. McLeod

Thank you, Mr. Chair. It has been about three years, but we’ll confirm that information and relay that on to the Members. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Chair. We appreciate the comment’s that the Member made and it’s correct, it is a team effort, not only with the folks delivering the program but I think it’s also the Members of the Legislative Assembly because, as I said before, without a lot of the support that they give us, it makes it harder for us to move some of our initiatives forward. So I think we can all take credit for that.

The decline in CMHC funding, I mean, that’s an issue that we’re going to have to deal with and we’ll have to continue to bring that forward.

The aging stock, again, that’s another one we have to...

Thank you, Madam Chair. To my right I have Mr. David Stewart. He is the president of the NWT Housing Corporation. To my left I have Mr. Jeff Anderson, vice-president of infrastructure and finance, NWT Housing Corporation.

There are about three elements to the collection approach for our rental units. First of all, we need to improve the collection of current rent and we did note that 97 percent was a good sign that progress is being made, and I think we see that in all areas of the Northwest Territories.

Secondly, we need to ensure that those who have accumulated arrears enter into some form of repayment plan, and we do obtain rental officer orders for these tenants. We’re currently seeing the number of tenants with large arrears declining as people are starting to dig themselves out of the hole, and we still...

Mr. Speaker, first of all, we’re very fortunate that the 17th Legislative Assembly has added about $2.1 million annually to the NWT Housing Corp to help offset some of the decline in federal funding. We do have a long-term strategy. I mean, we would hope that the federal government enters into an arrangement on public housing for long-term, stable funding in partnership with us, because we see that as a way of going forward.

But we are taking steps to address the declining funding. I’ve spoken to this before. We’re building more multi-family energy-efficient units to help with that. We’ve done...

Thank you, Mr. Chair. We don’t have that level of detail of information handy. We will compile that information and share it with the Members. Thank you.

Mr. Speaker, I’ll be glad to have a conversation with the officials and ask them about the units being shut down in Fort Simpson and how that’s going to affect our numbers there. I will gather that information and I will have conversations with the Member. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

We have 12 on the waiting list. As for the length of time, we don’t have that information. We will contact the local housing authority and let them know there was a concern raised with the length of time with the waiting list and how long is the average time on the waiting list. Thank you.

Mr. Speaker, it is our hope to try and address the homelessness. It used to be that it was more of a regional issue, but I think we’re finding more and more that it’s continuing to branch out into a lot of the smaller communities and that’s one of the reasons that we’ve come up with this program to try and assist with that.

There are opportunities there to tie into the Anti-Poverty Strategy and all the different pieces of work we’ve got going out there. We have identified some money through our corporation to help deal with this and we’ll continue to do so. I think we have about four or five...

Mr. Chair, the president has committed to providing that information. We don’t have the numbers offhand, but we will provide the information to the Members. Thank you.