Debates of October 14, 2005 (day 10)

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Mr. Chairman, with me today I have Debbie DeLancey, the deputy minister of Municipal and Community Affairs, and also, on my right, I have Sheila Bassi-Kellett, the director of corporate affairs with MACA, and Mara Heder who is the counsel with Department of Justice.

Thank you, Mr. Minister. General comments on Bill 9 by Members. I recognize Mr. Menicoche.

Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman. With respect to the amendments on Bill 9, I, too, would like to voice my concern with respect to the municipalities being able to collect outstanding fees that are owed to them through the taxation bill. It is laid out clearly here in the chair's opening remarks of the dispute mechanism that is noticeably absent. Already in the small communities, people are disputing their taxation bill because of overlaps of band and territorial government land issues or just confusion of who owns what land. That confusion already exists. Now we are also giving municipalities the opportunity to tack on water bills, library fines, et cetera, on these bills when they are already in dispute. I would like to know what the Minister has planned to build this dispute mechanism for this amendment. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

Thank you, Mr. Menicoche. Mr. Minister.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Mr. Chairman, the ability to transfer unpaid water or sewer bills, service bills, within a municipality applies to the municipal taxation authorities, which are basically the tax-based communities. This is a section that was in there historically. There has been a request to put it back in place. We don’t formally have a dispute mechanism as part of this bill. However, there is a section that allows the communities, through the municipal legislation, to set up a bylaw that will allow for the creation of a dispute mechanism or an appeal board. So the communities have that ability to do so. We, as a government, are not in a position to force them to do so, but the ability is there.

Thank you, Mr. Minister. Mr. Menicoche.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I guess I just have difficulty in playing a part in allowing somebody to lose their house and their land because they owe a library fine and they refuse to pay it for whatever reason, but they are maintaining their land taxes diligently, as many hard-working people do. If they have a dispute over water and sewer services and they aren’t paying it, it appears that we are allowing a system where they can lose access to their house and land because we are allowing the municipalities to tack on these bills and outstanding fees on the taxation bills. As a government, we are allowing this without giving it the thoughtful process of how are we going to stay responsible for this process. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Menicoche. Mr. Minister.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Mr. Chairman, it’s our view that this is a process of governments being responsible and also giving the municipal taxation authorities some tools in their toolkit to be able to collect outstanding arrears in the area of water and sewer and other services.

I want to apologize to the members of the committee. During our discussion, there was concern raised about what could qualify and we had to go back and do some research to really spell out the specifics. We have been able to do so, and we’ve been able to define what falls under this category. It’s only services that can be transferred over; arrears for services rendered by the community. We had talked about parking tickets and apparently this does not qualify. We have clarification on that. So this is something I wanted to clear up.

There is really no other mechanism for a municipal government to collect, failing this being in place; I guess a collection agency or just plainly cutting off the service. The communities wanted to be able to resort to a system that will allow them to put this as part of their property tax and get them a lot stronger way of collecting arrears.

Thank you, Mr. Minister. Mr. Menicoche.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I am glad the Minister clarified some of the allowables, as it were. I don’t know; my gut feeling tells me it’s an uncomfortable amendment. I know it’s already in there, but this particular amendment is uncomfortable to me. I don’t think it’s really thought out. Once again, we end up in a situation where something sounds like a good idea when we discuss it in generally, but when we put it into practicalities, it just doesn’t work out. I think here is another system that is just not going to work out because it’s the individual, the taxpayer, who is going to end up losing out in the end. Once again, in the small communities we have taxpayers that dispute it right from the get-go, and now to further burden them with water/sewer charges or whatever other charges on their tax bill…The Minister said it himself. They won’t be getting water and sewer if they aren’t paying it in the first place, so I don’t know.

There are people already disputing their land taxes in the small communities I represent, and to further burden their cause by adding water and sewer charges, I just don’t see what type of dispute mechanism the department is willing to put into this. Why are we just going to abdicate all of the responsibility? What kind of mechanism is going to be in place? Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Menicoche. Mr. Minister.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I want to point out that it should be clear that the ability to transfer unpaid charges to property taxes only applies to municipal taxation authorities, which are tax-based communities. That’s something that was in place historically from the 1970s. This is not new. This was by mistake left out when the drafting of the legislation was brought into place during the 14th Assembly. We are trying to rectify that. The communities have asked us to do so. There is the ability for municipal taxation authorities to create a body that will deal with disputes or appeals. That is under the legislation. That is through section 72(g), to be exact. We cannot force them to do that, but they have the ability to do that. If somebody feels like they aren’t being treated fairly, then they should go directly to the municipal council of their community. I am sure the council would be in a position to deal with it. If council is ignoring the right for an appeal, I am sure the public will change that at the next voting day.

---Laughter

Thank you, Mr. Minister. Mr. Menicoche.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I guess I have to ask the right question. Can the taxpayer lose everything he owns because he owes an outstanding water and sewer bill, yet his taxes remain paid up? Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Menicoche. Mr. Minister.

Yes, Mr. Chairman, that’s correct. If there are certain significant arrears and the municipality is unable to collect them, there is the possibility that the properties could be seized.

Thank you, Mr. Minister. Mr. Menicoche.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I cannot be in favour of something that doesn’t have an adequate dispute resolution attached to it. With that, I will end my comments. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Menicoche. Mr. Hawkins.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I am in favour of the amendments that are coming forward today. I will be voting in favour of them, but I do have some questions for ultimate clarity for the public. There is a notice for 30 days, and I had concerns whether that restricted someone’s right over the long term for suing the municipality. If someone slips and falls and didn’t notice the ill effects right away, does the Minister see that this notice of 30 days restricts somebody’s ability to sue for damages or the potential to sue for damages related to some type of slip and fall that they didn’t provide notice of? Can I get some clarity from the Minister on that?

Thank you, Mr. Hawkins. Mr. Minister.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Mr. Chairman, there is a 30-day requirement that notice would have to be given and a two-year statute of limitations after the 30 days to start action. Failing that, they would have to demonstrate to the court that there are reasonable grounds to explain why they couldn’t provide the 30-day notice. The 30-day notice is there so that the municipality has opportunity, in the case of somebody who slipped and fell, to see what the conditions were, to be able to check out why and how it could actually happen. If it were any longer than that, it would be very difficult. It also gives the municipality notice that there is a potential problem, and they can rectify it. That’s why the 30-day period is there. Other jurisdictions have different periods. I think Alberta has 21 days and B.C. has longer, so it differs. Most jurisdictions have a certain time period when you have to give notice by.

Thank you, Mr. Minister. Mr. Hawkins.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I appreciate the answer by the Minister. So a person can still sue if that’s the appropriate mechanism.

My next question is regarding the transferring of unpaid services to property taxes. It was I who asked if parking tickets would apply. The other day it was okay and today it isn’t. The Minister had said it’s only applicable to services. Could I get the definition of how the Minister sees what services are? Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Hawkins. Mr. Minister.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Yes, that’s correct. We had to do some research and get some clarity on what could actually apply. Apparently anything that is considered to be offences would not be applicable in this case. The transfer of unpaid charges only applies to the services that are provided by the City. Maybe I could get our legal counsel to give further clarity on the actual definition.

Thank you, Mr. Minister. Ms. Heder.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Under this provision, the only services that can actually be charged are the ones that relate to real property, and the specific services are actually defined in another section of each of those acts. In the case of the Charter Communities Act, it’s section 62. There is actually quite a long list. I can read those off, Mr. Chairman, if you wish. Okay, they are actually defined in each statute. So in the case of the charter communities, it would be section 62, so you can actually know which particular charges you would be looking at that could be applied to real property.

Thank you, Ms. Heder. Mr. Hawkins.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I guess my opinion on that is a parking ticket may not seem like a service to the person who is getting it, but it is a service to the community, as well as a speeding ticket. That’s a safety issue. I guess it’s a matter of definition. I am in favour of that. Would you define a library charge a service in this regard, because this was mentioned earlier today? I was asking specifically to parking and speeding tickets because there are people who have quite a lot of parking and speeding tickets out there and it makes it difficult for the city to collect on them. There are other things like ambulance fees that the City had difficulty collecting when I was a councillor. This only applies to those people who have property. Specifically, do you see ambulance or library fees falling into that category? That wasn’t an idea of mine, but let’s get clarity on that while we are here. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

Thank you, Mr. Hawkins. Mr. Minister.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Mr. Chairman, the services that qualify under this change are unpaid charges that provide a service. Anything that is considered to be an offence or anything that would go through a court system or quasi-judicial system would not qualify. That may be a simpler way of defining it. It’s a service provided by the municipal taxation authority, and if the service is provided by the City for an ambulance service, then that would qualify. A parking ticket would not qualify because there is a separate process for that.

Thank you, Mr. Minister. Mr. Ramsay.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I will keep my comments fairly brief. I appreciated the fact that we had the opportunity to go through the public hearing on these three amendments on Tuesday. I certainly can feel for the municipalities in their need to get these amendments approved and get on with life. I will be supporting the amendments as they stand. The one quick issue that I wanted to bring up, and I don’t know if it’s the way things are normally done, but we had the public hearing on Tuesday and somehow something funny happened right after that meeting obviously, because I think the department went back and consulted with the NWTAC after the public meeting and raised some alarm bells with the Yellowknife city councillors. We got a number of phone calls and e-mails yesterday for whatever reason. I think it was much to do about nothing. I would like to know, Mr. Chairman, if the Minister can tell me who consulted with the Northwest Territories Association of Communities. If we have legislation before us dealing with the Housing Corporation and we go through a public hearing, does the Minister responsible for the Housing Corporation go over and consult with the LHOs? The same can be said for any one of the departments. Is this a common occurrence? If it is, I would like to know because certainly if the Northwest Territories Association of Communities had some questions or concerns, they could have been at the public hearing the other day. I came away yesterday thinking that the City of Yellowknife thought that the Yellowknife MLAs were adamantly opposed to these amendments, and they’re not. I didn’t hear that at the meeting the other day. We asked some simple questions. That’s our job. I would like to ask the Minister for a response. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Ramsay. Mr. Minister.

Mr. Chairman, it’s our position, and certainly through my encouragement, to share our information with the municipalities. We are working with them, and we have a partnership arrangement. We have a number of working groups established, so we take every opportunity to share our information, share our discussions with them. In this case, we did debrief the NWT Association of Communities. We had our staff meet with them and inform them of what went on. Yellowknife is a member of that association. We can’t control what they do with that information. It’s up to them. We make it a standard practice to provide information or any kind of request they come forward with, especially when it’s public information.

Thank you, Mr. Minister. Mr. Ramsay.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I appreciate the Minister’s response to that, but again none of us that were in that meeting in GED knew that was going to take place. Perhaps in the future the Minister could let us know that that type of consultation is going to take place after the fact. I know it took place before the fact, but I didn’t know it was going to take place after the fact. I know it’s very important for the City of Yellowknife, very important for the tax-based municipalities to get on with things, and these amendments will allow them to do this. I don’t see any difficulty in approving these. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

Thank you, Mr. Ramsay. Mr. Minister.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Once again, I will point out that it was a public presentation, and we would certainly encourage the NWTAC to provide people to attend those meetings in person. We will voice the concerns that are being related to us for sure. However, having said that, it’s still our position, and I think it should be expected as standard practice on our part, that we will be presenting our information to the NWTAC. We have committed to doing that with them and have been doing that for the past several years. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Minister. I have Ms. Lee.

Thank you, Mr. Chair. Mr. Chair, I have some general comments and a question with respect to these amendments. My general comments are related to what Mr. Ramsay just stated. Listening to Mr. Ramsay’s statement and the Minister’s response, I think the Minister may be misunderstanding or missing the point that the Members on this side are trying to make with regard to what transpired in the standing committee process. Mr. Chair, let me just put it on record that I have no problem supporting these amendments. They are quite minor in nature. I have to tell you that I’ve been here…this is my sixth year. We spent almost the entire last Assembly addressing the needs of the NWTAC. We went through a huge revision of municipal legislation. All along the way, I believe that the House showed strong support for the aspirations of the committee.

Another thing about amendments that have to do with municipal power, I have a huge deference for the powers of municipal governments. I believe that the devolution of power to municipalities is a good thing. I could only speak largely for our City of Yellowknife. Their elected body, their independent body, is accountable to our citizens in a way that we are. They should have the freedom to make those choices. I have to tell you that it came as a great deal of surprise when we Yellowknife Members received these e-mails yesterday with red flags all over them. I had no idea that these amendments were even controversial. As I was trying to remember what these were, for those who don’t understand how we review bills in this House, we do get what is called a legislative proposal at the beginning of the process where the government comes and tells us a general idea about what these bills are suggesting. I do remember seeing the legislative proposal for this amendment way back, probably months ago. I remember being told that some of the amendments were something that were housekeeping in nature and that it was one that was missed. Substantively and procedurally, I would have been inclined to support them anyway. Given that I am not a member of GED, it would have been a natural course for me to have a second look at that once GED brings it to this forum, which is where it is at now.

I can understand the Minister saying that, as the Minister of MACA, and the department has a close relationship with the NWTAC, and so they should. But I think what he is missing is the fact that something got lost in translation. However they interpret it, it got into a real misrepresentation of what transpired at the meeting. I think we should all be alarmed by that. I think there is some misunderstanding, maybe in the departments about what it is that the MLAs do here. I say that in terms of many other things as well. Maybe they should be reminded. We ask questions. It is our job to deliberate. We should be comfortable. We should feel like we are comfortable in asking questions about what some of these amendments are. It shouldn’t be misinterpreted and misled to believe that, somehow, because we are asking questions, that we are opposing them. I have a very serious concern about that because half-baked or half-interpreted information can lead to problems that probably should not be warranted. I just want to put that on record and to state that I have an open-door policy with the NWTAC and the city council. I am always open to give my opinion about things that we talk about here. I am generally inclined to support whatever the municipal level and the local government wants to do.

That is my general comment. The Minister could choose to respond to that or not. I hope that the staff and everybody else will take our questions in good faith and that it is only simply a matter of us trying to do our job.

I have a question on the service question, because this amendment is speaking about being very specific as to whom the people could serve their notice. The requirement for service and who we serve that notice to is a huge area in law because, if somebody is being sued, it is only fair that you have to be notified that you are being sued. The situation gave rise to this amendment. I got that information, and I could see why the municipalities want to make it very specific that anybody who wants to sue the City for slippery roads, or whatever situation, that might result in a huge liability, that it be served correctly and served to a specific person and not somebody like an ambulance driver or somebody who is related to the City. I can see how the way it exists is so broad that the municipalities want to narrow the scope of people that may be subject to service. I am just wondering if we might not be going too much into detail. Like SAO for laypeople, they may not know what SAO is. I guess if you are going to sue the City, you will have to find out who you should serve it to. What if somebody just wants to serve to the mayor? What if they want to serve to councillors? I know this is an area that is well established in law. I want to know if anybody has done legal research to see if we are not, by this amendment, narrowing the scope of the individuals who can be served with respect to suits against municipalities. I don’t know if the Law Clerk wants to answer that, or the legal advisor. Thank you.

Thank you, Ms. Lee. Mr. Minister.

Thank you, Mr. Chair. Mr. Chair, we certainly take the comments about the briefing of NWTAC and the possibility of translation. Some of the comments may be misinterpreted through translation. That is not our intent. Our intent is to share the information and to share it in the best way we can. We will encourage NWTAC to attend the public presentations in person if it is possible for them. We will also encourage them to use Hansard. However, there is still that avenue that we have made the commitment for, which is to share information that's public with them and to talk about it. But we will take every opportunity to encourage them to get it first hand if they can.

Regarding being able to direct the notice to one individual, it was the intent of this amendment to make sure it is clear who can receive a notice of a court action. That person was the senior administrative officer. We would expect that a council would know as much to redirect an application or a notice to the appropriate SAO of the community. I am not sure if you want to add anything to that. Maybe we will have our legal counsel expand on that.

Thank you, Mr. Minister. Ms. Heder.

Thank you. I would just like to clarify with that particular provision. It is actually notice of the event, not notice of the intent to sue. So at that particular point in time, someone who has been injured wouldn’t actually have to have contacted legal counsel, although they may have at that point. They could simply provide a written notice. This does not require any sort of legal counsel in order to prepare it and submit that to the senior administrative officer.

Thank you, Ms. Heder. Ms. Lee.

Thank you. I think that changes quite a bit, really. That changes it in a way that makes it even more problematic for me in that I don’t think general citizens would, if they were walking down the city sidewalk and they get injured and they think about, okay, maybe I have some claim here, I don’t know if that person will think about going to an SAO to provide an intent that some time down the road I think I may be suing you if I can’t work because of my injury or I broke my ankle. I want to know what the law says. Is there any other jurisdiction that has something this specific about notice of event? That takes a lot of preparation for somebody in advance as to what he or she may want to do or not do. I would suggest that in that sort of case, a person might be more prone to going to talk to a city councillor or the mayor, going, you know, I got hurt walking down the street and I want you to know about that. I don’t know if that person will be thinking…How would anybody know they have to go to those means; that they have to go to the SAO if they want to do that? Am I misunderstanding this? What is the law on this for other jurisdictions and why are we having this provision? Thank you.

Thank you, Ms. Lee. Mr. Minister.