Thank you, Mr. Speaker. My questions today are for Minister R.C. McLeod. I was pleased to hear, earlier in the session, that the Department of Lands has instituted a moratorium on new recreational leases until a new made-in-the-NWT lands framework is developed. However, this does not address the unauthorized structures and land occupancy that has sprung up in the intervening vacuum.
What plans does the Minister have to address the proliferation of illegal structures we see already built and continuing to be built on public Territorial land? Mahsi.
Thank you, Mr. Bromley. Minister of Lands, Mr. McLeod.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. We’ve received a number of complaints from citizens out there as to citizens hauling material out. We did some follow-up, and in most cases, these were leases that were let. They have up to three years to put a structure on there. So most of them checked out and they had legitimate leases.
But for those that are squatting on Territorial land, as we call it now, we will take action against them. I think we’ve got 12 cases in the hopper right now that we’re working on, and as we continue to get more reports of people squatting out there, we will go and investigate. If we have to, we will investigate and pursue it further. Thank you.
I appreciate the Minister’s commitment there. Devolution certainly gave control of most of the lands of the NWT to the territorial government, but control is more than writing regulations – they sound good on paper, obviously – it is also having the ability and the will the Minister has expressed to enforce them. Unenforced regulations might as well not exist, as we’ve learned from our federal management experience.
What resources, money and people does the Minister plan to put into addressing the burgeoning enforcement issue in relation to these new regulations? Mahsi.
Before devolution, in recognizing some of the situations that we were facing, we had actually helped our enforcement division within Municipal and Community Affairs to deal with some of these. Since devolution and all the folks we got over from AANDC and the number of people that we brought on board, our enforcement division is a lot larger now. As for the exact numbers, I’d have to get those to the exact dollar figures. I would have to get those.
But I made a commitment to Members during briefing that we are committed to dealing with the squatting issue out there, and if we have to increase our enforcement and the money that we put into it, then that’s the route we will take. Thank you.
Thanks to the Minister. Just driving out to Behchoko, I estimate perhaps 100 cases of land occupancy en route. I have no idea how many are legal or not, but the last time I looked there were two leases between Yellowknife and Behchoko.
The Department of Lands has no inventory of illegal structures on Territorial land, of which we know there are at least dozens, possibly hundreds, despite their mandate, and a list of the legal structures in place through leases. It would seem easy enough to develop such an inventory, identifying all the structures and subtracting the ones which we know – the Minister would know having issued them – are legal leases.
How does the Minister propose to even begin enforcing newly minted regulations if we have no idea who is flouting them? Mahsi.
We have a pretty good idea of the numbers out there and names that are attached with them. We had over 550 personal and recreational use leases that came over from AANDC, not including the ones we had in MACA, which wasn’t that large of a number. We also know of fewer than 200 documented unauthorized users. So we know those numbers right now and we’ll work off those numbers as we work to complete our inventory of all land occupancy across the Northwest Territories and Territorial land and we will update our numbers again.
I’ve committed to provide updates to committee on a regular basis on the work we are doing. We do have some numbers and names that go with the numbers. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
Thank you, Mr. McLeod. Final, short supplementary, Mr. Bromley.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Thanks to the Minister. I’m hearing something different than I heard recently, that we don’t have an inventory and we can’t afford to make one, and that we have some indication of what’s legal, and that’s upwards of a couple hundred of unauthorized land users.
The Minister has indicated the mechanism for members of the public to report suspected squatters when they come across them in their travels across our commons is a worthwhile action, in my communications with the Minister. Such a simple instrument of capturing public capacity should be operational today in order to provide important perspectives on illegal occupancy during the development of regs and help prepare for the enforcement the Minister declares is forthcoming.
Why have we not heard about a way to incorporate the straightforward participation of the public enveloping such an inventory and when and how will the public learn about this initiative? Mahsi.
The public plays a great role in helping with the inventory. As I mentioned before, we do get a number of calls from the public, identifying or questions that they might have to someone’s occupancy. Sometimes we are able to satisfy their inquiry, and in some cases we find out it may be somebody that’s illegally on that land, so we will act on that.
There is an opportunity for them to call our department. I think we made it available on our website. We have developed a communication plan that we want to share with the public to let them know what they can do as far as reporting and having their input into the whole recreational leasing policy framework that we want to do. We have a communication plan and we will work with the Members and have this plan go public, so they have an idea of what we’re doing and where they can go for their input. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
Thank you, Mr. McLeod. The honourable Member for Nahendeh, Mr. Menicoche.
