Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I would like to ask the Minister of the NWT Housing Corporation some questions.
I raised the issue about the core needs income threshold and the application guidelines for constituents. I just wanted to know if there is an initiative out there that we have lots of homes and they need to be given away this fiscal year, how the process is going and what kind of special accommodations are they making when they are applying the guidelines there, Mr. Speaker. Are they going to stick to the old guidelines or will they be more flexible this year in terms of allocating units and/or agreeing to applications? Thank you.
Thank you, Mr. Menicoche. The honourable Minister of the NWT Housing Corporation, Mr. Robert McLeod.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I am assuming the Member is talking about homeownership units or public housing units. If it is a homeownership unit, as I stated on a couple of occasions, I have asked the corporation to be a little more flexible on how we allocate the units. The application process is done now, so the regions are just analyzing all the information and then we will be able to do the allocations. Thank you.
Mr. Speaker, I guess one of the single biggest issues that constituents have raised with me is that the people that can afford it and have the good incomes, perhaps double incomes in the smaller communities, are actually being rejected from the applications because they are actually making too much money. But because we have such an arrears with our Housing Corporation, Mr. Speaker, I think these are the type of people that we should have within our Housing Corporation programs. These are the people that are hard working. They are able to make mortgage payments, and thereby the corporation would be able to generate revenue. What is the Minister going to do about addressing their concerns and allowing this range of people to apply for our programs? Thank you.
Thank you. I completely agree with the Member that these are the people that we want to capture, and that’s the reason I’ve asked the Housing Corporation to become a little more flexible in how we allocate. We hear a lot of stories of people that are just over core need income threshold that are being denied and it’s my wish to try and get these people into homeownership. Thank you.
Perhaps the Minister can clarify for me exactly why that rule is there. Why is there an upper limit? In the bigger centres it kind of makes sense, right? I mean, you don’t want to disrupt the existing housing market, but a small community like Nahanni Butte, even Fort Simpson, which is not really a market community either and these people are being denied. So I’d like to know the reasoning why this guideline and/or policy exist. Maybe the Minister can clarify that for me.
On the higher end of core need income threshold we have too many people that are over that that are deemed to be able to secure a mortgage or are not in need of any subsidy from the Housing Corp. But it is something that we continue to monitor and look at, because the Member is correct that in some of the smaller communities there might not be a level playing field as some of the market communities. So this is all information that we plan to do a program review of the whole housing choices portfolio. Thank you.
Thank you, Mr. McLeod. Your final supplementary, Mr. Menicoche.
Thank you very much, Mr. Speaker. Sounds like there’s going to be a re-evaluation of the core need income threshold or the guidelines. Perhaps the Minister can tell me if that’s something they’re planning for April 1st, or is that something that the Minister and department can apply for this intake season, which the application was October 15th.
Thank you. The whole program review will be undertaken in the ‘11-‘12 Housing Choices Program. We have to, as a department, corporation, look at the core need income threshold and see if it’s meeting the needs of the people in the Northwest Territories, and our goal was to get more people into units. So as a corporation, becoming a little more flexible in how we try to get those people into units. I believe after this intake period we’re going to see success in getting more people into a lot of these units. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
Thank you, Mr. McLeod. Time for question period has expired. Item 8, written questions. The honourable Member for Frame Lake, Ms. Bisaro.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, I seek consent to return to the orders of the day, item 7, oral questions.
---Unanimous consent granted
