Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, I'd just like to follow-up with the Minister of MACA on some of the comments and their answers this afternoon. Mr. Speaker, the Minister spoke about having a face-to-face with Sport North Federation. Can the Minister please provide a brief summary on how that meeting went and the next steps moving forward? Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
Masi. Minister of Municipal and Community Affairs.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Yes, a meeting was held with Sport North probably, and I may be wrong, was probably about two weeks ago, although my dates might be a little bit foggy, it was just recently though. Sport North did come in because they were concerned about the process with the Sutcliffe Report. They were concerned about where they fit within the bigger pictures, in honestly. So we talked at quite length about the funding arrangements. We agreed at the end of the meeting that the funding would stay within the Government of the Northwest Territories, but that we would work with Sport North and all of the sport and recreation organizations to actually develop plans to see where they would go in the future, what they would present within their three-year plan that they'll be bringing forward to us for December, and how we see their role within the bigger sports, recreation and physical activity strategy for the NWT. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
I thank the Minister for her answer. It is my understanding that the territorial sport organizations passed a similar motion not in the springtime, in the fall time, that Sport North would still remain their funding agent; that the funding would go through them. Can the Minister please advise if she's received this motion and the status of it?
We did discuss the aspect of Sport North previous holding and delegating out the funding that was received through the lotteries. During our meeting though they did come to the understanding that wouldn't be possible, that the GNWT would be holding the funding. But we did talk about various ways that the territorial sports organizations could apply for funding. Sport North was saying some of their representatives, not all of them, did want to go utilize them to go through and to apply for the funding. So we were open to that and we're allowing that to happen.
I thank the Minister for her answer. So, Mr. Speaker, can the Minister please provide us with what the department is doing with the other TSOs that are not utilizing this Sport North Federation to prepare for the short-term and long-term plans as we move forward? December, I believe that's the deadline. So I thank the Minister for that knowledge.
So the Government of the Northwest Territories, the Department of Municipal and Community Affairs has made a commitment to work with all of the territorial sports organizations to assist them in filling out the applications for the territorial funding. We do have a standardized application form, and any organization that needs assistance with filling out that form is being told that we are more than happy to work with them, to sit with them, and to help them figure out how to work through the form. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
Masi. Oral questions. Member for Nahendeh.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker, and I thank the Minister for that answer. I'm very happy to hear that the department is willing to work with the territorial organizations so that they're successful in applying for the funding. So can the Minister please provide us an update of what the department is doing for the next six months or year in regards to this program, or maybe in the next little while? Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Actually, the department is really busy at this point to try to make all the changes necessary to bring the lottery monies into the Government of the Northwest Territories. So basically, the next steps include the development of a legislative proposal that sets out the legislative changes required to implement the recommendations of the report, which will be followed by the introduction of amended legislation. After that, we're going to be looking at the development of the NWT physical recreation and sports sectoral policy to guide where we're going within the sports organization for the whole NWT. Based on that sectoral-wide policy, we'll be developing an NWT strategy to meet the policy.
