Mahsi, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, my original questions were geared for the MACA Minister, and unfortunately, or fortunately, for him, he's not in the House for the next couple days. However, I do have questions for the housing Minister.
I understand there were several public housing units operated by Housing NWT on the reserve on KFN, all who had to evacuate. My question is what arrangements were made to accommodate these evacuees to find suitable temporary accommodations in other communities? Mahsi.
Thank you, Member for Deh Cho. Minister responsible for Housing NWT.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. And thank you to the Member for his question. We do work with the emergency management team as well. So with those evacuees for public housing on the K'atlodeeche Reserve, they were encouraged to come here to Yellowknife to the emergency centres. And with that, we did follow up with the public housing tenants as well, and we're trying to find suitable accommodations for their return back to K'atlodeeche. Mahsi, Mr. Speaker.
Mahsi, Mr. Speaker. At the point of evacuation and the days leading afterwards, there was no messages or messaging to the public renters on available accommodations or what Housing NWT was going to do to accommodate finding them suitable units, and many were, you know, handicapped and many were elderly, and there was many women that were pregnant at that time. So I'm really wondering how Housing NWT missed that boat. Mahsi.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. And thank you to the Member as well that, you know, I just want to really elaborate that we were dealing with an emergency for Hay River and K'atlodeeche. I did work with the MACA Minister, as well along with my colleagues, to look at what how would we be responding and how would the residents of Hay River be taken care of. They were encouraged to come here to Yellowknife and further looking at their suitable accommodations here.
Unfortunately, we didn't look at the available public housing units here in Yellowknife as well too, but we are working directly with those tenants as they return back to the community. We do have ten federal housing units that are available in Hay River today. We are working with the community to look at the allocations of those units. And I will look at further updates for the Member. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
Mahsi, Mr. Speaker. What I'm getting at there is that the renters in the housing public rental units on the reserve are the responsibility of Housing NWT in the Northwest Territories, and not go for any other community. And I'm wondering why was there no provisions made to pay for accommodations like hotel rooms and their meals while they were temporarily removed from their public rental units? Mahsi.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Once again, I really want to just really include that we are a part of emergency management throughout the Northwest Territories, and we respond as one government in supporting this initiative through MACA.
Right now, we are in the conversation with the communities as well too and looking at what are we going to be doing for housing replacements in K'atlodeeche, also looking at our affected clients, both in Hay River and K'atlodeeche. We do have access to federal units right now, but we are looking at the ongoing conversation with the chief as well, what are we going to be doing and how are we going to be responding, are we going to be putting new units on the ground, are we going to be looking at the federal units that are currently there. This is a further discussion that we are having at the community level. Mahsi, Mr. Speaker.
Thank you, Minister. Final supplementary. Member for Deh Cho.
Mahsi, Mr. Speaker. And mahsi to the Minister for those answers. There have been about four of the public units that were burnt and also five seniors’ homes on the Beaver Road. I'm wondering what are Housing NWT's plans to replace those units moving forward? Mahsi.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. We are working directly with the emergency management and also with K'atlodeeche as well and looking at to finding further solutions to replace those units. There's actually ten units that have been affected. I'm not too sure of the condition and if we've actually lost all of those units or if there's just severe damage to them. But as we go forward, I will provide those updates to the Member. Mahsi, Mr. Speaker.
Thank you, Minister. Oral questions. Member for Monfwi.
