Statements in Debates
We have no new public housing or no public housing replacement units for Detah/Ndilo in this fiscal year. As far as the long-term plan, I would have to see what our long-term plan is.
Again, we have the major retrofits that we’re planning on doing there. As far as the long-term plan, again, we’re using the recently completed Community Needs Survey to help us to determine our next allocation of capital projects, and as soon as we have that, then we will share that with committee, obviously, and we’ll have an opportunity to have a discussion on the Community Needs Survey in our briefing with...
We appreciate the Member’s comments before about noticing a lot of the newer units going up in the communities. We appreciate that and it’s a good idea for some of the work that we’re trying to do in addressing some of the issues with housing.
The solar panels, we’re looking forward to seeing how they work. Biomass is not one that is slated for these particular projects, but it is something that we are exploring when we are putting up our other infrastructure. We’ll be looking at that. Of course, with the declining CMHC funding, we’ll have to find ways to try and cut back on our expenses and...
Oh, right. The situation in Hay River with the panels. So, Mr. Chair, I will turn it over to Mr. Stewart.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. We have our assistant fire marshals that are stationed in every region, and part of their duties is to go out to the communities to ensure that they have adequate training. If the community requires training or requests training, then our folks can go in there and assist them with that. They can help them identify the types of equipment that they may need. All the communities are funded so that they are able to purchase equipment if they have a need for it.
It’s actually 1.15, not one, as the Member pointed out before. But we’ve made significant investment in the last number of years, and I would like the Northwest Territories to be the judge of the work that the NWT Housing Corporation is doing, because they’re seeing it on the front lines. They’re seeing with the new rent scale how you go from a $4,600 full economic rent to no more than $1,600, and somebody’s rent goes from $1,200, because they’re working, to $564. I challenge anybody to say that the NWT Housing Corporation is not addressing the needs of housing across the Northwest Territories...
Mr. Speaker, I feel we’re providing more than one house per community. We looked at the community needs survey that was done. We tried to identify some of the highest needs in regions and communities, and we target our investment into those communities. Also, with the market housing initiatives, we’ve had meetings with the NWT Teachers’ Association that identified some of their more challenged communities, so we have tried to target some of our units into those communities.
We have 100 units over the next three years that are going to the communities. That’s just market housing communities...
Mr. Speaker, that’s something we can work on. We can work with the communities and say that we would like to come in at a certain time, offer some education on fighting fires and potentially a course. So, we will work with the communities and see if we can make that happen. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
We would like to see a good, strong volunteer fire department in every community, and the key word is “volunteer.” In every community they have to rely on the volunteers. Most communities have a fairly healthy volunteer fire department.
Once they have the volunteers or the volunteers identified, then we can work with the community as far as training goes and help them identify some of the equipment that they may need. So, we would like the communities to take the initiative to get their volunteers out, and then will work with them to ensure that there is some training that’s available to them...
If you look at the units we provide, or if you look at the housing we provide, and if you look over the number of years, we have 3,100 units; we have 23 public housing units that we have on the ground, plus our Market Housing Initiative and our other units that we provide.
I attended a conference that spoke to Aboriginal housing down south – a couple of Members actually came with me – and I think the Northwest Territories is doing a fantastic job providing houses. We heard the story of one house every 15 years for a particular community down south, so I think we’ve done a good job in...
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. We all recognize that housing is a big concern across the Northwest Territories, and in working with the Legislative Assembly, I think the Housing Corporation has done a fairly good job in trying to address all the concerns that are out there.
To the Member’s question, we have… Well, this past year alone we have 46 public housing units, replacement units; we have six new housing units; we have a couple of seniors units – three, actually, seniors units that are being built – then we have 29 new market housing initiatives where we are putting 29 units into communities...