Minister McLeod, I believe it’s page 6-12, last sentence.
Mr. Chair, I wasn’t prepared for that particular question, so I will get the information and share it with the Member.
Thank you, Mr. McLeod. Mr. Hawkins.
Mr. Chair, I accept that from the Minister. Under strategic planning, what youth initiatives do we have at this particular time being developed? Thank you.
Mr. Chair, as far as new initiatives and youth go, we’re just continuing to enhance the programs that we already have in place. Obviously, we are always looking at ways we can improve the programs we provide to our youth. Thank you.
Can the Minister elaborate what enhance the existing programs means? Maybe he can list the youth initiative programming that we offer under our strategic plan. Thank you.
We have a number of great programs designed for youth. When I talk about enhancing, I think if there are ways that we can improve on the amount of money that we give them, I think that would go a long way. As far as some of the programs go, we have our youth contributions, youth centres, youth core and we have a regional youth sporting event. We have a number of great programs that are designed for our youth.
Under strategic planning, I have a particular question. I guess I will have to prompt myself because the Minister said I guess the questions were mine because he didn’t want to answer them twice. Would this be the section to ask about active living for seniors? If not, maybe he could inform me as to what page that I need to ask this question.
Mr. Chair, actually, I think the Member is free to ask questions on any page he chooses. If he chooses to ask them on this page, then I will do my best to try and answer it. Thank you.
Mr. Chair, I accept that offer from the Minister. I guess he didn’t mean that I shouldn’t feel sorry for myself because my question wasn’t asked, so I will ask it on this page. What type of application can we involve in getting seniors more active? I suggested it in the opening comments. I was looking for an answer of what type of programming, services we can offer seniors to maybe working with youth. This seems like an area or type of planning, development and research under policy support for the department. We do not offer specific budget line items for seniors in this regard. As I highlighted in my example in my opening comments, I wasn’t specific at the time, but I was referring to the NWT Seniors had received a contribution through the Sport and Rec who gets their funding from MACA, but seniors cannot get support money directly from MACA because there is no programming mandate. Thank you.
Mr. Chair, was there a question or was that just a comment? I don’t believe I heard a question.
Thank you, Mr. McLeod. Mr. Hawkins, was there a question embedded in that?
Mr. Chair, I have all evening too, so I am prepared to answer all the questions that the Member is going to have on every single page that we are reviewing. If I missed an answer in all his questions in my replies to general comments, I apologize. Hopefully we can continue to debate the numbers in the budget and the work that we’re doing. We do try.
We have a number of programs. Get Active NWT is one where through the Sport and Rec. I think it is the NWT Parks and Rec Association where they do a lot of fantastic work. We’ve actually had one group take us up on some funding. We had an Elders in Motion conference here about two weeks ago. It was well attended by folks all across the NWT. They got a lot of valuable learning tools and a lot of valuable exercise out of there that they can go back to their home communities and use that when they’re working with the elders and seniors in the communities. There was, I believe, close to 100 people taking part in this conference. I thought it was a great example of how we’re using some of the money from the Sport and Rec Association specifically that put this program together. I thought they did a fantastic job.
If there are ways that we can improve how we distribute money or if there are ways we can work with the seniors more closely, I know we welcome any input from all Members of the Assembly. Thank you.
Mr. Chair, just for the record, I don’t take issue with the Minister offering to answer my questions. I more so took issue with telling me not to feel sorry for myself because he didn’t answer my questions.
Specific to the issue at hand, what will it take to get policy initiatives that develop opportunities for seniors to be active in their living? The Elders in Motion sounds like an example of it. How do we make it policy? How do we support it? How do we give it a budget? Thank you.
Thank you, Mr. Hawkins. Mr. Williams.
Mr. Chair, yes, we work closely with our social envelope partners, Department of Health, Justice, and Education. It is some initiatives that we always look at active living. We have a strong partnership with the Department of Health putting together Healthy Lifestyles. I think certainly our seniors across the NWT will benefit from the work of this committee and recommendations that will come out of the social envelope committee.
Mr. Chair, I appreciate that answer, but one of the problems with that is we don’t have a direct policy for a mandate under a department. How do we get a policy statement by a department where it falls under an activity description that supports seniors and active living? We have one under MACA that truly represents and bolsters the needs that fall under youth and certainly what support the youth need. How do we get one in the Municipal and Community Affairs that supports seniors with dollars? Thank you.
Thank you, Mr. Hawkins. Minister McLeod.
Thank you, Mr. Chair. I can commit to working with committee and receiving some input from them. When we go through the next building business planning process, there’s an opportunity. If committee comes forward with some recommendations, then I will commit to the Member that we will look at that and I will work closely with the Minister responsible for Seniors in the NWT to see how we can improve our support for active seniors across the Northwest Territories.
Mr. Chair, I will accept that as a fine answer. Thank you.
Committee, we are on 6-13, Municipal and Community Affairs, activity summary, directorate, operations expenditure summary, $4.395 million.
Agreed.
Thank you. Page 6-14. Mr. Hawkins.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Under community government, although I don’t need to go back to 13 because it’s just the page here, but it is the break-out of that particular page. Under community government, can the Minister explain how community government at $168,000 is broken out and proscribed?(sic) Thank you.
Thank you, Mr. Hawkins. We’ll go to Ms. Young.
If you’re speaking to the community government funding under grants, that money is the Extraordinary Funding Policy which is an application-based policy for expenses the community government incurs that are not anticipated or not planned for and fit under the Extraordinary Funding Policy. That funding is not allocated per se. It’s an application-based process.
What is the framework of the application-based based on? Thank you.
As I said, the policy is intended for use of an expense that’s incurred that a community government could not plan for, could not anticipate and cannot absorb within their financial resources that they have. Since the New Deal was implemented in 2007, most community governments have access to funding that can deal with most things that do arise. We actually haven’t seen an application that met the criteria of this policy funded since prior to 2007.
Thank you. The next question was going to be, could I have some recent examples. So I guess there are none. Followed by, I guess the only other question of that is what would be considered a normal example if the New Deal trumps this? What’s left to apply for? Thank you.
Thank you, Mr. Hawkins. We’ll go to Minister McLeod.
Thank you, Mr. Chair. As Ms. Young said, the last time it was used I think it was prior to 2007 and it was for a landslide in Fort Smith, but the Member is correct in talking about with the New Deal is there anything left we can fund. So we’ll have to go back and have a look at it, and if there’s an opportunity to remove it from this or re-profile it, then I think we’ll have to go that direction. Thank you.
I’m trying to understand why it would be still there since 2007. I could see 2008 may make sense, maybe even 2009, but considering the fact that, if I understand it correctly, we’re six budget cycles in and it hasn’t been used in six budget cycles. So why has it been left there? Thank you.
Thank you. I take full responsibility for that because I’ve been Minister of MACA for going on four years now. So I should have been able to pick that up. But I will commit to the Members that we’ll review this $168,000 and if there’s an opportunity to re-profile it or take it out completely, then we’ll do that. Thank you.
Thank you. I look forward to that commitment and update.
Under contribution funding, we have contributions to the NWT Association of Communities and Local Government Administrators, as well as the Arctic Energy Alliance. Now is a good time to sort of ask what does our contribution work towards. Is it base funding or what type of accountability does our funding provide and what type of relationship have we struck with this, other than being a funding source? In some cases I know we sit on the board and I want to know what relationship. Thank you.
Thank you. The Arctic Energy Alliance, our deputy is actually the vice-chair of the alliance and we’re with LGANT and NWTAC. The money goes towards base funding and we have a really good working relationship with LGANT and NWTAC. We rely on them a lot because they do represent the administrators for pretty well all of our communities and councillors and mayors from all of our communities. So we rely on them, we work with them very closely on initiatives and some things we run by them. They have their annual general meetings, they put motions forward, they submit them and we have a look at them. So we have a great working relationship with these organizations. Thank you.
Thank you. Our contribution, do we have any requirements attached to it? Thank you.
Thank you. They have a requirement to report to us on an annual basis.
What does that actually mean? Do they have to file a report, do they have to do a presentation? I’m trying to understand that. We’ve heard these stories before about annual reporting and we found that several places had been late in their annual reporting. So I’m trying to understand what are they required to report back with and in what form. Thank you.
Thank you. Reporting on an annual basis means they have to report to us once a year and there’s a number of requirements. We have audits and we work very closely with them and advancing some of the issues of the people from the Northwest Territories. So we do have some requirements. If the Member wants a hard copy of some of the requirements we have with these funding partners, then I’d be pleased to provide it to him.
Thank you. Would the Minister be willing to provide that? I know he alluded to if I wanted it. So that is the request.
Thank you. We’d be willing to provide a copy.
Thank you. Under Arctic Energy Alliance under contribution funding, I think the Minister had mentioned that Deputy Minister Williams here sits as vice-chair. What’s the role of MACA on the particular board? I don’t want to say the Arctic Energy Alliance is an NGO, but they are sort of akin to one. If government is all on the board or assaulted the board with government reps all through it, where is the role of the public and the public help guiding it? I’m just trying to understand how government funds it, but lets it go, but manages it, but it’s independent. So I’m trying to get a sense of their role here. Thank you.
Thank you, Mr. Hawkins. For that we’ll go to Mr. Williams.
Thank you, Mr. Chair. I guess our role in the Arctic Energy Alliance, we’re a contributing member that has voting rights. They also have other memberships where we have industry reps that sit, like Avalon Industries sits on the board, it’s made up of not all GNWT representation, but also we’ll have it open up to industry and others such as the Power Corp sits on there as well. Our role is set in policy. We’re a voting member, we guide the organization to make decisions. We just recently had a board meeting just a couple of days ago with full attendance. Representation at that meeting was the NWT Association of Municipalities, the Power Corporation, we had Public Works and Services, ENR, MACA, and Avalon, I believe, was on the call. Basically setting direction and approving work plans for the future of the operation. So we let the administration look after the day-to-day activities, but we’re more the guiding board to guide the activities. Thank you.
Thank you, Mr. Williams. Mr. Hawkins, one last supplemental.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman. The deputy minister was very helpful in providing a bit of a list as to who is on there. Perhaps I could get a formal copy of who sits on this board of governance. I’m just trying to understand what does voting rights mean in this particular case. So if I could get a list of its membership as well as its membership activity. So, in other words, I think he’d mentioned Avalon being a rep, but obviously Avalon is not government. So are there two or three seats signed to industry, other agencies, et cetera? I’m just trying to get a sense of their role on why they’re there and if he could explain what voting rights mean in this regard. Thank you.
Thank you, Mr. Hawkins. Minister McLeod.
Thank you, Mr. Chair. All of the information that the Member is asking for is on the website. Thank you.
Thank you, Minister McLeod. Mr. Hawkins, your time is up. I will go to Ms. Bisaro.
