Tom Beaulieu

Mr. Speaker, ensuring our residents are able to share the benefits and responsibilities of a unified, environmentally sustainable and prosperous Northwest Territories is our shared vision. Infrastructure is a key part of achieving that vision and our government continues to participate in research that will improve northern infrastructure design and protect our northern environment.

I’m pleased to announce that Transport Canada will be providing $669,000 from the federal Northern Transportation Adaptation Initiative to proceed with two new innovative research and development projects on the...

Thank you. I agree. I will contact the deputy minister of Human Resources as soon as I am able to do so, most likely tomorrow morning. We will have that discussion and she, in turn, will contact the rest of the departments to see what type of safety plans are in place for the safety of our public service. Thank you.

Thank you. As we do here in the Assembly, we go through a safety drill. My understanding is that each of the departments through that committee can do safety drills for their own departments or their own floors and offices. I’m not sure how recent or how often these safety drills occur. I can check with the Department of Human Resources who, in turn, will have to check with all of the departments and we can get an update on that. But that would be the process. Thank you.

Mahsi cho, Mr. Speaker. I have a constituent in the audience. I would like to recognize Cheryl Mandeville.

Thank you, Madam Chair. I had indicated earlier that we were going to take a look at how things worked with the current equipment for one season with what equipment was in place, and if it appeared to be very difficult for the community to manage, keeping the airstrip cleared with the current equipment, then the snow blower would be a capital item or an item that maybe they could work with the rest of the community to determine whether or not that would be high up on the community’s capital list as well.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I can give the Member a snapshot of what we have on PeopleSoft October 31, 2014. There were 19 vacancies. Usually by September all of the positions in the schools are filled so that there will probably be no vacancies there, but with the rest of the GNWT there are 19 vacancies in the Mackenzie Delta at that time.

We will have our engineers look at this again along with the city and there will be some question on whether or not a flashing yellow light is a safe way to cross the road. It depends on the condition of the road and the lighting. I know that we have good lighting at Niven and if that is the solution, if they are able to cross the road and safely walk as far as the Legislative Assembly entrance, we will look at that along with the city.

The report has not gone to committee, but the report is on the website.

The solution would most likely be a capital solution, and we will work with the city and see if there is a possibility that we could bring something forward in the next capital plan. We know that almost any solution would be an expensive solution. Any time you have people crossing a highway, walking across a highway, it‘s not a safe thing to be doing. So, it‘s a solution that will likely be costly if we want to safely cross a highway.

This answer requires a little detail and I’ll ask the deputy minister to respond to that.