Rylund Johnson

Yeah, thank you. I appreciate that, that seems like good money. Can I just get a bit of a sense of whether there are any plans to centralize the way we do maintenance? When I speak to the LHOs, you know, sometimes there's push back about what they're responsible for, what we're responsible for, what exactly gets in the schedule. It seems to me that the housing corp should probably have a piece of software that has every single unit in it and every single thing that's been done and all of that's inputted. You know, I know that we are really decentralized in this area. But is there any plans to...

Thank you. Can I get an updated figure of the total amount of money we owe CMHC? Thank you.

Yeah, thank you, Mr. Speaker. In fact, we don't use income testing for anything in public healthcare. And if you show up to the doctor, it doesn't matter how much money you make; you get services provided if you are sick. And that is exactly what we were trying to do with people who had these specified disease conditions. And my concern, Mr. Speaker, is we're now asking people to go out and try and find third-party insurance when they have diseases which makes it very difficult to get third-party insurance. We're asking people to put their coverage at risk, and it is causing them a lot of...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I think it was quite clear in that public engagement that lots of people were very concerned about the proposal to remove the specified conditions. Can the Minister confirm whether the plan is to draft that new policy that will, in fact, remove those specified conditions? Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Last fall, the Department of Health and Social Services went out to consult on their extended health benefits policy. And on first glance, it seemed that the plan was to expand coverage and means test it, something I had no opposition to. But upon a closer reading, it was clear that that plan was to do that at the expense of the specified disease conditions in the schedule to that policy, Mr. Speaker; something I do oppose.

And, Mr. Speaker, so the department tabled their “what we heard” report and in that report, it was pretty clear that there was support for expanding...

Yeah, I guess I'm curious as to why that you know, I get that they're agencies but some of them are, in fact, registered nonprofit societies and fit under federal grant applications and most certainly would be able to go get money. And, you know, the money from the feds might be something as simple as some training for staff, energy retrofits, or building housing. It just seems having another group apply for money of their own initiatives has zero downside. I get we might want to keep a bit of an eye on making sure they're not just building assets with, you know, without the maintenance...

Yeah, thank you. Is that something we are considering revisiting? I know, for example, the City of Yellowknife just bought an apartment building and is looking for someone to manage it. You know, the Yellowknife Housing Authority already manages hundreds of units. It probably would not be that much of an incremental cost to them to manage another unit. Are we willing to let any LHOs explore the possibility of managing other people's assets? I'll note that argument probably goes just as well for Indigenous governments who are looking to build their open housing but probably don't want to get...

It seems like there should be some way for the housing corp to get that off their books and have it treated like all the other GNWT assets. You know, it just seems odd that we're paying ourselves tax. But I'll leave that as a comment.

I did have a couple questions about the scope of authority of LHOs. I guess I'll start with, do any of our LHOs own any assets, whether that be housing or the offices they work in or anything at all? Thank you.

Yes, I guess I'll start with a comment that it would be helpful I know that this is a finance template to include those positions. I know every time we go through this you get lots of questions about where jobs are in communities. And if any of these jobs move in the Housing Corp positions in the community, we talk about it but clearly the majority of staff are in LHOs. So I think some transparency there would be helpful for everyone. But I'll leave that as a comment.

My other question is I see under community housing services, there's $2 million approximately in property taxes and land...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Well, you know, and I think this is a tough policy question. There has to be a way to write it because take Walmart, for example, one of the largest corporations in the world, we presently if they bid on food services, we buy a few hundred thousand dollars-worth of food in this territory, we give them some extra money. And I get they have a building here and they have staff here but my question is, will the Minister remove Walmart from Schedule 3? Thank you.