In this particular case that area is withdrawn and we have made it known that we are not entertaining any leases on any of the areas that are withdrawn. This would, I suppose, qualify as a recreational area. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
Thank you, Mr. McLeod. Final, short supplementary, Ms. Bisaro.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. It goes to the desire of this group to establish an area where people can go and use motocross-type vehicles to get them out of going into the bush, so they aren’t destroying land which we don’t want them to destroy. The land in question has previously been used as a track. There are not going to be any dwellings on there, so it’s not going to be near any water. There are no lakes close to that and it’s unlikely that it’s going to be a prime site for any kind of a cabin.
So, if the use of this particular site is agreed to by the Yellowknives Dene or the Akaitcho Government, the Aboriginal government within which area it occurs, would the Minister consider entertaining a land lease for this particular site? Thank you.
We will do our consultation with the Aboriginal governments and get their views known. Again, the particular piece of property that we’re discussing, once the interim withdrawal expires, then we would consider taking leases on this particular piece of property. The issue we’re facing is we have had a lot of concern from folks around the capital that they find that too many of the areas are overpopulated and that’s one of the reasons we are doing this work, is we want to identify, through the rec leasing framework that MACA did… There was a lake that we had identified that had some potential cabin sites on it. The public told us no, that wasn’t a good idea, so we backed away from that and didn’t earmark any of them for cabins. Once we do our consultations, then we will determine our next steps and keep all Members of the House informed of our progress going forward. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
Thank you, Mr. McLeod. The honourable Member for Sahtu, Mr. Yakeleya.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. My questions are to the Minister of MACA. The athletes in the small communities are really doing well. Based on the early TEST Olympic skiers program they had up in Inuvik, is there any type of pilot project considered within the department, along with a partnership, to look at a program that once worked well and developed Olympic athletes? Is there something like that within his department for the Northwest Territories?
Thank you, Mr. Yakeleya. The honourable Minister of Municipal and Community Affairs, Mr. McLeod.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. We would like to see all of our young people in the small communities, or in all of the Northwest Territories pick up physical activities, sport being a good one. Through this government in the 16th and 15th Assemblies we’ve dedicated a lot of funds to that effect, and we’re starting to see the results of it now. I talked about the Arctic Winter Games a couple years ago when we had 27 of the 33 communities represented by athletes, and I think that indicates a lot of the good work that some of our sporting partners are doing. The Aboriginal Sport Circle, Sport North, the Rec and Park Council, they’re delivering a lot of programs out to the communities with some financial support of this government. So, we’re starting to see the results of that now and we continue to try and build on that because we could potentially have the 2023 Canada Winter Games here in the capital and we’re looking forward to having our athletes compete and do well in that. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
I’m not too sure if I’m suggesting that we’re pulling away from the good work that the communities and the people in the North are doing. What I’m looking at is a concept, an idea that we focus on a group of athletes in the community that would measure them in the results of the home life, the school life, the athletic abilities, you know, moving them through the stages of their growth and their ability. Like TEST did one time, we could look at this one program. Whether it be volleyball or hand games or basketball or martial arts, that we have a group and we measure them and say this is a good program. It can be equivalent to the TEST program that we have something here to develop these students through grades 6, 7, 8, 9 to Grade 12. That’s what I’m looking at. I’m not too sure if the Minister is looking at something like that. Thank you.
It’s not something that we are looking at right now. I know one of our sporting partners might be looking at something along those lines. But our sporting partners do provide a lot of workshops and that in the communities. They identify potential up-and-comers. We have a number of programs within the department that supports. Once they get to a higher level we have the Elite Athlete Performance Grant and we’ve had a lot of uptake on that. We have a lot of athletes competing and doing well. So, there are a number of programs that we offer.
Again, the concept is very good. One of the challenges that we may face with a lot of these potential high performance athletes is having to move them all into one centre, and there may be some opposition to that. But these are things that we can identify as we go forward. Because, as I said before, we do have the Canada Games potentially coming to the NWT in 2023 and we want to make sure our athletes are ready to compete in that. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
Thank you, Mr. McLeod. Final, short supplementary, Mr. Yakeleya.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I always thought this would be a good concept to consider given that the limitations of some of our small communities and that we have to do without facilities such as the larger centres, that would help our athletes move into another level of category of their sporting abilities. I thought that something like this would be good for our small communities. For example, even with the youth hand games, the kids get really excited going to other schools to play hand games, and this way you keep them in school and keep them moving forward.
So, I just want to ask the Minister, is that something that could be considered and maybe flushed out over the couple months that we have here?
We need to take all these into consideration because, at the end of the day, getting our kids active is most important first of all. We have a number of active after-school programs that we support. We have, as Member Moses spoke to today, the Traditional Games championships going on here in the capital for the next couple days and it’s a great opportunity for, as the Member said, a lot of kids from communities getting together, trying out the games of other cultures. I’ve had the opportunity to go there a couple times and they enjoy that. They’re actually quite competitive.
Getting our kids active is the first step. Identifying potential athletes that might want to move on to the next level would be another step. Again, our sporting partners work very closely in identifying a lot of those young athletes that have potential, and we try to develop them. Again, I mean, this is something that we need to take into consideration going forward because, I think, as we’ve seen from the Yukon model, they have some great training opportunities over there. We’ve seen it in the Canada Games. I think they got a couple of gold medals, silver and two bronze medals. Actually, one of the golds was won, as Mr. Blake said, by somebody from Fort McPherson, so we’ll take some of the credit for that.
Thank you, Mr. McLeod. The Member for Inuvik Boot Lake, Mr. Moses.
QUESTION 715-17(5):
NET METERING PROGRAM
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. We all know there’s a high cost when we’re paying some of our utilities within our residences as well as commercial with the businesses. Today I have questions for the Minister of Finance in terms of our Net Metering Program. I know I’ve brought it up before. We hear Members’ and Ministers’ statements about we want to diversify our economy, support small business, support people in the communities.
I want to ask the Minister of Finance, with our five kilowatt cap that we currently have within our Net Metering Program, has that been reviewed and looked at so it allows people an incentive, such as businesses who would like to install solar panels into their communities to cut down on the costs that they incur over the winter months and be able to utilize it during the summer?
Can I ask the Minister, will that policy be reviewed so the kilowatt cap actually increases?
Thank you, Mr. Moses. The Minister of Finance, Mr. Miltenberger.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. That cap has been removed.
If the cap has been removed, how has that been made aware to the people, residents and commercial businesses fin the Northwest Territories that that cap has, in fact, been removed so that they can go ahead and move forward into looking at creating some solar?
That program is handled through the Power Corporation, and they’ve been taking care of the communications. If there are specific concerns from the Member, then I would be happy to talk to them about what may be needed to be done extra to ensure that those concerns could be addressed.
In terms of this initiative and the kilowatt cap and that being removed, we also have this Energy Efficiency Incentive Program. I was wondering if the Minister would look at seeing if there are any dollars that can go into that program to create more incentives for businesses and residents to take this initiative and this program into their own dwellings and businesses.
The energy programs have been consolidated in Public Works and Services including those incentive programs. Those incentive programs are funded. There are different types of programs for energy-efficient appliances, for assistance with installation of solar and other alternative energy sources, so that opportunity currently exists in those programs and will now be handled by Public Works and Services and the Minister of Public Works and Services.
Thank you, Mr. Miltenberger. Mr. Hawkins.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Yesterday in Committee of the Whole it was discussed about the fuel barrels left throughout the Northwest Territories. I’d like to ask the Minister of Environment and Natural Resources, does the department know how many barrels there are? I’m not speaking to every single barrel, but I’m speaking to the large volume of barrels we estimate are out there and the general location of the larger cache of barrels. I mean, we can always understand there will be one or two here and there, and those are difficult to track unless you stumble upon them.
I guess the question is: How many barrels do we estimate are out there and do we have the rough location as to where these environmental liabilities are out there?
Thank you, Mr. Hawkins. The Minister of Environment and Natural Resources, Mr. Miltenberger.
Thousands, Mr. Speaker, and they would be invariably in areas where there were old abandoned sites either for exploration or some type of small mining venture from the days of yore, but a lot of it tied to exploration sites.
What is the plan of Environment and Natural Resources to address this environmental liability that has been left on the people of the Northwest Territories to carry this burden and to be financially responsible for it? In other words, does the Department of Environment and Natural Resources have any type of plan in place or plan for the future to address this liability of these fuel barrels sitting there on the land?
The issue has been flagged. It’s on our to-do list. We’ve been using the resources and capacity that we do have to look at the full rollout of our electronic waste recycling in addition to all of the other recycling programs that we’ve come into in the last few years. The barrel one, one raised in the House, as well, by the Member for Sahtu, for example, for the vehicles that have been abandoned are all things on our list that we intend to get to but not any time in the life of this government.
Well, that’s okay if the government doesn’t intend to get to it because they’re either not interested or too busy, but I’m not uninterested, and I’m certainly not too busy to bring up good ideas for the department to get to work on.
As such, would it not make sense for the government to consider putting a bit of fee, a reward or a bit of bounty on every one of these barrels?
By way of example, and I know the Minister likes examples, so for example, if we put a $100 fee or reward or return price on every one of those barrels, we could fund that out of our environmental recycling fund. That way we could help clean up some of this environmental liability and at that same time we get Northerners involved in this process cleaning up the land. It would be a way to do this with the department not having any plan at this point.
I would be happy to concur with the Member that he is a fountain of good ideas. We are 270 days left until the next election. We have our to-do lists, work lists that are fully subscribed to. We are working to implement all those plus some others that have been added on over the course of the last year or so.
The Member raises a very legitimate, good issue. The issue of putting a fee, a recovery fee on each barrel is there. It’s a question of the resources and the time. We have an Environment Fund that is being used and managed carefully to do all the things that currently are in place. To start taking out significant sums of money at this point without a clearly thought out plan would not be the wise use of those funds.
Thank you, Mr. Miltenberger. Final, short supplementary, Mr. Hawkins.
First off I want to say, I dare not argue with the Minister’s keen eye and good observation of the assessment of the work being done here. I certainly like to agree when he’s right.
My final question is: Would the Minister be willing to devote a bit of time and policy development in his department to take some assessment of this particular potential? We have people travelling on the land in different forms, be it on the lakes and rivers through their boats, be it on skidoos and other modes of transportation, and what a great way to reward people on their long trips out on the land by putting a little money in their pocket. Say, $100 a barrel. They could be bringing them back and we could be doing a good thing. All I’m asking for is a little policy development.
Would the Minister task the department to at least flesh out the idea to see the merits behind it?
I was making the comments about the Member being a fountain of good ideas because we all know he tends to hide his light under a bushel and he’s very self-deprecating and humble, so I wanted to give him that little bit of promotion to help with his battered self-image.
So I will add that to the list that I have as I meet regularly with ENR and we will give it the consideration it deserves. Thank you.
Thank you, Minister Miltenberger. The Member for Range Lake, Mr. Dolynny.
Mr. Speaker, I’d like to continue my questions with the Minister of Transportation on my topic today, which is the Yellowknife Airport.
Clearly today, we’ve heard 20 years of a government of complacency. We’ve heard about a government of perpetual planning where the guiding principles of “delay, defer and defuse” I believe are alive and well in this government and a government that is much okay with losing $2 million a year.
Given that the Yellowknife Airport is bleeding, as I said, to the tune of $2 million annually, can the Minister inform the House what are the short- and long-term strategies to financially balance the shortfall so that it’s not on the backs of the taxpayer? Thank you.
Thank you, Mr. Dolynny. The Minister of Transportation, Mr. Beaulieu.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. This evaluation of this RFP is going to get us to look at some options that would address the cost of operating the airport. As I indicated, and as the Member also indicated, this is costing us about $2 million. So, the option could be if we want to address this immediately, it would be to raise the price of the tickets of the travelling public, or we could raise the cost to the companies that are operating out of the airport. Again, they would probably likely just pass the costs on to the tickets. So, I would say that if we wanted to raise the $2 million, it would cost the travelling public about $10 a ticket because, even though there are 500,000 passengers travelling through the Yellowknife Airport, that’s usually 250,000 tickets. Thank you.
Thank you. I’m disappointed that the Minister would use scare tactics such as let’s just raise the price of tickets for passengers, let’s raise the prices for the airlines themselves. This is preposterous. These scare tactics are just being used to camouflage what I consider poor management, bottom line. We as a government have a responsibility to be better managers and not use scare tactics.
Can the Minister indicate to the House in the wake of almost every other airport of similar volume and size in Canada developing independent authorities, why is the Yellowknife Airport being held back for maximizing its benefit for its community? Thank you.
Thank you. The fact is it costs $7 million a year to operate the airport and our revenues at this time are $5 million. So in order to make the numbers match, we’d have to raise revenues by $2 million. So that could be an airport improvement fund on the tickets, like I indicated, or we reduce the operating costs or maybe reduce service at the airport to reduce the costs, but those are the costs now. So the government is now looking at those three different options that I indicated: an airport authority that is in place in many airports; a Crown corporation, which would be similar to the Housing Corporation; or a revolving fund similar to the petroleum products division. Thank you.
When a Minister is answering a question of how we can do things better, rather than using scare tactics maybe we should maybe run things a bit better. That might be the main solution to a lot of the problem we have here.
In its final report to the Minister in 2003, the report called it “the analysis of en route alternative airport facility and requirement of associate issues.” It states and recommends that a number of improvements for extended range twin-engine operation, or ETOPS, and a capital requirement of $19.4 million to extend runway 15-33 to a 10,000-foot runway.
Can the Minister indicate why 12 years later we are still waiting for this national and international emergency provision? Thank you.
The fact is it is the money. If we’re going add a fair chunk of capital on to the already large amount of infrastructure that’s at the airport that we are paying for, then it would be a matter of having to increase the costs of the airport again. If money was no object, we would have probably extended that airport quite some time ago. Thank you.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Final, short supplementary, Mr. Dolynny.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I think the Department of Transportation should take notice on how to run a business rather than government sometimes.
Finally, 11 years ago in the 2004 Final Report of the Yellowknife Airport Development Plan, it called for the reconfiguration of the existing passenger terminal building and development of a new west side terminal complex, emergency response service, de-icing facility and other major retrofits. The entire cost of the proposal, estimated in the order of $100 million, was to be spread over the next 20 years.
Can the Minister give us an update to this progress? Thank you.
Thank you. Change is a difficult thing when you’re operating at the airport. We have tried to initiate some of those changes that were not too intrusive and it was difficult to do. So we are still looking at those things and it has taken some time, but the airport is operational. We are expending more money than we are taking in at this time, so we’re looking at some options now that would not pass too much of the costs on to the travelling public. Thank you.
Thank you, Mr. Beaulieu. The Member for Frame Lake, Ms. Bisaro.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I’d like to ask a few more questions to the Minister of Lands and follow up on some of my previous questions about the Recreational Land Lease Policy. The Minister advised that there is a moratorium, that there is land withdrawal and I’d like to first off ask the Minister, when did this moratorium and land withdrawal first start and when is it expected to be done? Thank you.
Thank you, Ms. Bisaro. Minister of Lands, Mr. McLeod.
