Mr. Speaker, housing has a cyclical effect in the NWT. Where housing is inadequate or unsuitable in small communities, the cost of housing is unaffordable in Yellowknife. Inaccessible housing, housing in disrepair, or simply not enough housing and lack of local resources and employment funnel NWT residents into our territory’s capital. According to the Bureau of Statistics, 17 of our 33 communities lost residents from 2020 to 2021. Housing plays a significant role in supporting community residency and in turn Arctic sovereignty.
Housing NWT maintains a suite of housing programs, including home purchase, home repair, and public housing. But NWT residents with public housing arrears cannot put their names on public housing NWT waitlists or access housing purchase or repair programs.
The Standing Committee on Social Development traveled to multiple communities across the NWT to hear from residents about homelessness prevention. I want to thank NWT residents who shared candidly with committee and invited us into their homes.
One family we met lives in a renovated work trailer from the 1980s with 10 family members from three generations. Their home has no working furnace, dangerous electrical, and a bed in every space. This family does not qualify for home repair programs and cannot put their names on public housing waitlist because they have arrears from decades ago.
A second person we met was an 87yearold elder who is still working to pay off their public housing arrears while staying housed. This elder is not employed and uses their pension to make payments leaving this resident with $300 a month for the rest of their living expenses.
Housing NWT’s own arrears collection principles stipulate that Housing NWT will adhere to a standardized and consistent approach to collections; that arrears should be collected in a timely and efficient manner; that tenants and clients should not accumulate large rental and mortgage arrears that are difficult to collect; and, that arrears should be forgiven where collection is not possible.
Mr. Speaker, how does collecting arrears from an 87yearold elder adhere to the principles of collection? How does holding a family accountable to unaffordable arrears from decades ago and, in the process, withholding access to housing programs adhere to the principles of collections? If housing is a human right, why do we have housing policies that force people to prove they deserve to be housed, that they deserve dignity, rather than policies that meet people where they are at and access a toolbox to achieve the goal of housing Northerners. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
MR. SPEAKER:
