Thank you, Mr. Speaker. In follow-up to my Member's statement, I have a couple of questions for the Minister responsible for Housing. I would like to ask the Minister: are we on schedule for the completion date of the elders home in Fort McPherson? Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
Masi. Minister responsible for the Northwest Territories Housing Corporation.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I want to thank the Member for his Member's statement and recognizing that our elders are important. Allowing our elders to live in an area where they can continue practising and teaching our youth their cultures and traditions is very important. We are expecting to have the completion this summer, sometime in June. I don't have an exact date, but I will keep the Member, as well as the residents and the elders, updated so that we know when we can do the move-in. I just want to thank the community for their patience. I know that this was a project that was a little bit complicated, and we had to deal with it.
I want to thank the Member for bringing this up, and we will keep the Member updated so that he can keep his residents and elders updated as well. I don't have an exact date right now, but we are looking at sometime in June. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
It is good that we are on track here. When does the department plan to have their grand opening?
Once we have a firm date, we will let the Member, as well as community leaders, know that we will be opening it.
One thing that I do want to mention is the design that we did fix and change up. There has been a design for improved accessibility, high energy efficiency, as well as having a space for health and wellness programming. Once we do have a firm date for the opening, as I mentioned, we will have the elders, the community, and the leadership know when that day is. As usual, as the Member knows and Members around the table know, McPherson really does do a good job when we celebrate things as such.
We know that we are going to finish the building in June. When will the department hire a caretaker? That way, that position is in place before the elders move in.
As I mentioned, we are looking to open it next month. We are hoping that we will have elders into the eight units and have a caretaker in place. We will have to go through the regular process. As is tradition, we do have our people taking care of our people. As the Member noted in his Member's statement, our elders are very important, and we will have somebody capable to take that position on. As we progress through the opening and working with the seniors complex, we will keep the Member apprised, as well as the leadership in the community of Fort McPherson.
Masi. Oral questions. Member for Yellowknife North.
