Thank you. Does the Minister of Justice wish to bring witnesses into this House?
Yes, I do.
Does the committee agree?
Agreed.
Thank you. Sergeantatarms, please escort the witness into the Chamber.
Thank you. Would the Minister please introduce his witnesses.
With me I have Charlene Doolittle, deputy minister of the Department of Justice, and James Bancroft, director of corporate services. Thank you.
Thank you. I will now open the floor for general comments on the Department of Justice. Do any Members have general comments? I'm going to go to the Member from Yellowknife North.
Thank you, Mr. Chair. I'm hoping this can be a bit of a Q and A because I'm interested to hear from the Minister how we can build better ontheground outreach services that integrate or work with law enforcement and teams of social workers, health support workers, to ensure that we have a better way of addressing social issues that are not necessarily criminal in nature but that often get, you know, punted to the RCMP out of lack of having other places to call. And so my understanding is that the Minister's interested in this idea but I don't see it in the business plan so far. But can the Minister explain how we might start going about putting an approach like this in place and what his plan might be for it? Thank you, Mr. Chair.
Thank you. I'm going to go to the Minister.
Thank you. So that's a pretty big question. The puck has dropped so I will try and keep things short. But there are when we talk about crime and crime reduction, and I always say, you know, enforcement is just one part of it, and the department is responsible for enforcement but also looking at other ways to address those issues. So one program that has been running a few years, although, you know, interrupted with many of the events we have seen as a territory, is the Community Safety Officer Program. So that's one where it is not an enforcement unit. It is community members who work with individuals to help, I guess, avoid situations where the police might be involved. And it could be the thing that always sticks in my mind is just giving people a ride home from a party. If there's a woman, instead of having her walk home perhaps intoxicated, they might give her a ride. So those kind of little things in the community can go a long way. Of course, there's other departments who are involved with things like funding the Street Outreach Program. We talked just recently about integrated service delivery in the Department of EIA and how that can assist individuals stay out of the criminal justice system. We also provide funding for men's healing program to help prevent men from committing acts of intimate partner violence. So there are a number of ways. But the question is bigger than the Department of Justice. It is crossdepartmental and going forward, like I've said before, we've added RCMP across the territory every year since I have been Minister. I think it's now time to look at how can we supplement the services they offer with some of those more social services by partnering with other organizations. There's nothing the business plan doesn't speak to that or the mains at this point, but that is the path that I'd like to see us go down. Thank you.
Thank you. I'm going to go to the Member from Yellowknife North.
Thank you, Mr. Chair. In some other jurisdictions, they have some innovative models where law enforcement might partner with health workers or counsellors so that if you call an emergency line say someone calls 911, if they're having a mental health crisis or something, currently, you know, the options are send ambulance or send RCMP. But in other jurisdictions, there's models where there's sort of a third option where you could send, you know, crisis counsellors or people with more appropriate training to deal with mental health crisis. Is this something that the Minister is willing to look into? Thank you, Mr. Chair.
Thank you. I'm going to go to the Minister.
Thank you. So I think we would be the minor partner in that program. That would likely be something the department of health would lead if we're talking about mental health workers responding to crises. So I'm happy to work with the department of health examining things like that, and that's sort of the model that I was speaking of. But we would not be the lead department on something like that, depending on what this hypothetical model would look like. Thank you.
Thank you. I'm going to go to the Member from Yellowknife North.
Thank you, Mr. Chair. I'll leave it there for now, but I just wanted to make sure that this idea stays on the radar. Thank you.
Thank you. Any further questions from Members? I'm going to go to the Member from Range Lake.
I have general comments rather than questions, but the Premier's free to ask or to answer or speak to what I have to say. But I'm quite pleased with what's being proposed in the main estimates and also the business plan. The legislative agenda for this department is sufficiently robust in both the kind of machinery of government or machinery of the public service that has to bring forward things like Miscellaneous Statute Law Amendment Acts and the Legislation Act and the unsexy pieces of legislation. Forgive that forgive me if that's unparliamentary but that's really what it is. But we do have some very an ambitious agenda for improving public safety and giving law enforcement the tools it needs to succeed.
I have you know, this is the issue of crime prevention and crime reduction is not one it's not solved by more police on its own, but we do need to have a robust response to organized crime. And what's been increasingly apparent is we have a drug crime problem and an organized crime problem that are intertwined and taking advantage of our most vulnerable citizens, particularly in the small communities. If we do not have a robust law enforcement response to these predators, we are not going to be able to keep communities safe.
I have never seen so much violence in my hometown of Yellowknife as I have this these last few years, since the pandemic. There have been murders every month this year I think, including, you know, newly discovered ones that are or suspicious deaths that are most likely related to drug crime. There are handguns found throughout the city now, not long guns but handguns. Crack cocaine is everywhere, in every community. These are not caused by a public health addictions problem. These are caused by gangsters from the south who are, again, taking advantage of our most vulnerable citizens. So we need a multifaceted approach. I think over the years, governments have been investing in social support and infrastructure. We've seen Housing First be rolled out in the Northwest Territories to varying degrees of success. We've seen the men's healing program be redeveloped and reoffered. We have the judiciary has been very active in supporting different ways of dealing with criminality. And integrated case management started in the Department of Justice for chronic recidivists and users of the system. So I think we have been trying to get a handle on it, throwing a lot at it, you know, and then it's all underpinned by intergenerational trauma and the legacy of cultural genocide that was the mission of the Canadian government, the colonial Canadian government that they still must make amends for. But regardless of that reality, regardless of the systemic factors that lead us here and continue to keep people trapped in poverty, trapped in addictions and difficult to treat, it does not change the reality that we have armed thugs in our communities praying upon these people, and we need to give police the tools to deal with that. And this budget does that in a significant way. And I'm very pleased to see that, that it was not something we needed to fight for. It was not something we disagreed with with the Minister, with the Cabinet, with the Premier. It's something we can all get behind. And, yeah, we can do more than just cops, absolutely. I think that's underway. I think we have resources in other departments as well, and we have a commitment from this from the Premier, from this Minister, to integrate those services so it is not just a onelens approach to this problem. But if we neglect the support we need for law enforcement, we are not going to address, you know, the people who are making the problem worse in our communities. And that's what I wanted to say today. I'll have other commentary for key activities, but this is a big issue for me. This is you know, I have a relatively quiet suburban part of Yellowknife that is my riding of Range Lake, and even out there in a residential dense area, people are feeling unsafe which I didn't you know, again, growing up here, I didn't think it would ever feel this way. I thought we were removed not immune, but certainly removed from the worst of it, and that's just not the case anymore. So I'm hoping that with this budget, we can start to take action and turn the page on this, bring these predators to justice, and protect the people who need protecting the most in the Northwest Territories. Thank you. And thank you to the Premier for bringing this ambitious budget forward. Thank you.
Thank you for your comments. I'm going to go on to the Member from Inuvik Boot Lake.
Thank you, Mr. Chair. Mr. Chair, I echo the comments of my friend, MLA from Range Lake. I'm not saying he stole my thunder; I think he's added to it. But it's good to hear that because we hear that a lot in the small communities, and often times you wonder if the MLAs outside of the smaller communities understand what it's doing. Because it is destroying small communities, not just it's not just a problem, it is destroying small communities. Drug addiction, the influx of gangs, the influx of drug dealers, is destroying it. And I bet to say every MLA here from a small community will tell you they get weekly, if not daily, phone calls from people with concerns and/or complaints or are scared or they're an elder living in the building that they know there's issues going on. If you've campaigned like I did, you've probably seen it with your own two eyes. People living in a unit and drug dealers actually in there with them, you know, paying them sums of money to go to a door and hand out drugs. It's ridiculous. And we talked about well, why aren't there that many people at Aurora College? Well, they're not in Aurora College because they're doing other things they shouldn't be doing and it's again, it's a massive, massive problem. More than I think we even realize, and it's going to destroy small communities.
So, again, as my friend from Range Lake said, I applaud the department for putting the extra funding in. I would say is it even enough? You know, we have to we have to focus or efforts on this. We have to. And I know it's interdepartmental. I know there are other things that we need to do, whether it's treatment centres, where it's aftercare programs, where it's housing initiatives. All those things tie into this. But at the end of the day, it's justice. It's we need to make sure we make people safe. And, yeah, and I applaud it too. As I I don't have a question, but I did want to make that comment because it's so important. And I hear it regularly. And I'm glad that MLAs in Yellowknife hear it regularly as well because it is devastating for our small communities. Absolutely devastating.
So yeah, I would support more, Mr. Premier. So, yeah, I think it's great, a good start. Let's you know, let's get moving on this. Thank you, Mr. Chair.
Thank you, for your comments. The next on my list here, I got the Member from the Dehcho.
Yeah, thank you. I too want to say reiterate what the last two Members talked about. This department needs to work together and protect people. Crime rates in my region, I could say for a couple of the communities in my region, is very high. People are afraid, and lives are being destroyed because of the drug trade. And, yeah, so what I have to say, I guess, is give the police the support that they need to combat these crimes that are happening in our communities. It's sad to say that people in my community of Fort Providence can't even leave their homes unless there's somebody there to watch their house because it seems like every night a person's gone, somebody's breaking in their house. And people don't have the resources to help the police, I guess. And so it's causing a lot of chaos in the community. The crime rate is high. I went to a court proceeding one time. It was standing room only. So we need support in all the departments from health to education need to work together to help the people somehow and, like, community wellness to do something to help the people. Community justice, there's young people that are getting charged for firsttime offences because there's no committee in place, stuff like that. Those things don't need to happen this day and age. So that's what I wanted to say. So thank you.
Thank you for your comments. And I'm going to go to the Member from the Sahtu.
Thank you, Mr. Chair. I too support a hundred percent here on the three previous speakers, on the emphasis. And I can't stress enough the need to focus on today's society. Today's society is plagued with a lack of work, lack of industry. It's really designed to plague on the weak ones and the weak ones are vulnerable and in comes these opportunists with their drugs. And to me, it's really shocking. I have never seen my home community in Fort Good Hope so torn apart by the influx of drugs. And now we're getting phone calls, as the Member from Boot Lake said, as late as 9, 10 o'clock at night. I think if we all witnessed that, we would understand the need for capital to address the society today.
To give you an example, another example of many, we invited the Ministers of Infrastructure and Finance to the Sahtu communities, and we went to Fort Good Hope. The amount of questions was just unbelievably long because people out there are waiting for the authorities to come to their communities to offload their concerns to the appropriate individuals, to help with the redesigning and bringing back the traditional values to our communities, which are basically lost. There seems to be no industry there. Just to gauge that, are we making new initiatives to attract investment by the closure of the OROGO office when we haven't even really did a rights issue and sale? We cannot say that the rights issue and sale has respondents in the neighbourhood of five, ten oil companies, because we haven't done that. But yet we're going to take an inactive approach by shutting that office down when we haven't even gauged its potential.
And I really emphasize the need for, and I encourage every Member of Cabinet to go to the communities, spend a night there, listen to the elders, the parents.
The workforce opportunity in the private sector is so low, responses to national competitions are left with no responses. Zero. How can we encourage the outcomes of education when that workforce or that age group is plagued with addictions? And yet we throw more money on what is probably not going to materialize. So I think we got to learn to go to the root of the problem and design our business plan to address the weaknesses of society in our area.
We've got a weak energy sector. I would say we would all be shocked tomorrow to find out the number of employees that did not show up. I see that every day. And as a result of your employees not showing up, no production is done. This is why our public buildings are deteriorating, because of lack of maintenance. Now is the summertime to winterize and improve your efficiency of the building, including maintaining those boilers. But yet on the other hand, if we don't got employees showing up, it ain't going to get done.
So those are just some of the examples, but you got to really experience the examples by going to these smaller communities and talking and listening to people. Some of them may not be encouraged in a public forum but if the invitation was there to meet one on one, I would say we would all be shocked on the amount of requests we're going to get to meet privately to discuss the troubling drug and alcohol problems that we're facing. And as a result of that, today's society is I actually feel sorry for a lot of people that I see, whether it's at Stanton Hospital or out in the regional health centres. So being mindful of the resources' need, where the priority is, if we stay the course, I think we can see positive rehabilitation outcomes and a reformed society out there. And I'll have questions in this department at the appropriate activity there. Thank you, Mr. Chair.
Thank you for your comments. I'm going to go to the Member from Monfwi.
Thank you. Yesterday I talked about the drug problem, drugs and crimes in my region. Not just my region, but it's in all of the small communities. And, yes, Mr. Rodgers is right that, you know, it is destroying our communities. It's destroying the life of our young people. It's a major issue. It's a big problem, especially in small communities because we don't have lots of resources in small communities but the drugs are coming in like even taxi coming in from larger regional centre to small communities when they know the RCMP are off the road when they're not working. You know, like they come at certain time to do drop off. That's another issue too that's you know, it's not healthy.
In my community this past weekend, this was an incident that happened, but nobody told us. Like, we have I mean, I haven't heard from the authority or anybody that, you know, what happened because there was a lot of people. There was, like, the army. There was the SWAT team. It's involving drugs. But, like, I mean, it was a chaos for a while. There was it was busy and then all of a sudden everything died down. And it happened this past weekend. And we don't even know, like there's lots of rumors going around but I don't want to repeat any of those rumors, you know. Like, it's just it's not right for me to do that. But so that happened. And in small communities, you know, like, for I do like the fact that there's a lot of RCMP because with a lot of RCMP present in my community, we do feel okay. We do feel a bit safe. But it just goes to show that for based on per capita for my community, we shouldn't have that much amount of RCMP presence. So it just goes to show that we do have a major issue, you know, in my region, in my community. So I just wanted I want to say it's not right but it's just that it's not fair for my the constituents in my region, you know, one of the community two communities, they don't have any police services. So they don't feel safe, you know, because they don't have no RCMP detachment. They don't have nothing there. So they are more vulnerable than some of our people. But with the drug activities, the vulnerable people, the elders, the little children, are most affected. And we have lots of children that are in care already but because of this drug activities, there's more children in care. It's a voluntary agreement. But if it wasn't for grandparents, I think there would be more than 100 percent of children in care. But it's not happening. So what we need more is that for me, I think we need to start with the youth, with the children. We need to introduce we need to talk to the young people, or we need to have an awareness or an education program starting or have it part of our education curriculum, school curriculum starting with JK. I know they're young, but they know what's going on too. They know why they're sleeping at grandma and grandpa's house, you know, like so they know what's going on. They can feel it. They can see. And they can hear it. So it does have a major impact on a lot of community members.
There's a lot of good people living in small communities. I cannot say that everybody's bad, but it's just that it's the addiction. It's the influx of drugs coming in from outside, and it's not helping our communities. It's not helping anybody, but it's destroying the lives of our young people. It's having impact on them mentally and emotionally. And just like Danny said, you know, like, what's our future going to look like for the workforce? You know, like, because we are relying on our young people to take over one day, and that's what the leaders are always saying, you know. So we need to do something before it gets out of it is out of I don't think it's really out of control yet, but I think we can do something. We can do more to stop it so that it doesn't get too far that it's destroying our future generations. And not only that, but that and the long term, you know, we know these illegal drugs, they're made somewhere in people's warehouse. Wherever it came from, we know the prescription drugs how it's made, but these illegal drugs, it's not to be consumed. But a lot of young people are consuming it. So what kind of impact it's going to have on health care in the future? So that's a thing that I'm kind of worried, like. It's going to have a major impact on health care. And these are young people that they have so much potentials. They have a whole life. The whole life you know, I mean, they have so many years still ahead of them and yet, you know like, I mean, if we don't do anything now, it's going to be too late for some. But before it gets to many of our young people because the crack cocaine is the one that's more readily available in small communities, and they're cheap we know they're cheaply made, and they're easy and cheap to buy. Even weeds are also laced. We know that, you know. And so if you buy off a dealer, what I heard is a lot of those are laced with fentanyl and other strong chemicals. So that's why a lot of our young people are addicted to it. This is what we heard from people who are trying to educate our young people, you know, like to discourage them. So I think for me what I do like, you know, what I see here, and I know that it's in the business plan of how they're going to do it, how but I think more education, more awareness needs to be done, and because with the justice system it also needs to be done in jail as well because the repeat offenders, you know, like, we need to do something more. But I just it's more of a comment that I think that we should start right from JK. For me, that's what I you know, I don't know how my colleagues feel. But I know that it needs to be start we need to get to the young people before it gets out of control and destroy our communities and destroy the lives of our young people who are going to take over in the future, you know, because the Baby Boomers are a lot of them retired. Generation X is next, and Millennia. So it's the Millennia that we have to worry about and then the other and then JK, young people in JK so we need to do we need to do more. And I like what I see in here that I know the department they have a plan in place. So I just want to say thank you. So it's just more of a comment. Thank you
Thank you for your comments. I'm going to go on to the Member from Mackenzie Delta.
Thank you, Mr. Chair. I too would like to echo the comments of my colleagues. In my community, my region, we've been experiencing a lot of drug activity. It's overtaken the place of the marijuana trade. There's more people that we don't even know that are in our communities. They're taking advantage of the vulnerable people and taking over their houses. For instance, we have a paraplegic young guy in our community and he's staying in a housing unit, and some of these guys come from Edmonton or down south and they know this guy already because everybody knows him from down south, I guess, and that's where they set up shop. And there's times that this individual, he's scared to go to the authorities. So the only place he can go is his grandmother's house and just try to get some sleep, and he leaves those guys at his unit. And there's a lot of people scared to intervene. The RCMP, the community's losing confidence in the RCMP because the RCMP are feeling exhausted because they feel that they're taking on all this responsibilities. It was manageable before all these hard drugs came in, but now it's unmanageable. They don't have the resources to do it. They're taking on the roles of family counselling and all these other roles. Because when an individual is addicted to these hard drugs, it doesn't affect only that person. It affects the family. It affects the community. And it also takes a toll on the resource people within the community, the RCMP, the health centre. Every department in the government is affected by one person's use.
When we went on our social development tour in Aklavik and Inuvik, we had a meeting with the RCMP and the sergeant there stated that, you know, the only way that we can combat this drug the drug trade in the NWT is to get these people that are addicted, get them some help so the dealers don't have any customers. And I've always stated that it's just not the individual that needs to get these counselling services, it has to be the whole family. Like if you send one person if you send the individual out, then he goes out for extended period of time and he comes back and his family wouldn't know how to deal with him. So if we're going to take this approach of trying to heal our people, we have to look at healing the whole family right down to the children.
The RCMP in Inuvik stated that if they had a drug task force that dealt with drugs only, but it's a big trade. It's all over. And I don't know if just one drug task force can take on this responsibility. It would be a 24/7 job there. But he said if that force was initiated, then maybe that the other RCMPs can concentrate on other their other responsibilities of protecting the communities.
Just before Christmas in my hometown of Fort McPherson, we had five deaths in less than two weeks. I know there was and I believe four of them was drug related, and one was unknown. It wasn't revealed. But I remember sitting with the chief at the time and the next thing she got a phone call, so she had to go out on the porch to take it. She called me and said we have to go we have to go inform another person and while we're just dealing with one, the community was gathered at the community hall because we just lost a young person. Then we had to go to another family and tell them that, you know, they found their son dead, overdosed. So that got pretty hard on the leaders. It affects everybody. It affects the family. It affects the individual, the community. And the support is there, but it does have an impact. And I like what's going on within this budget but I look at the gun and gang strategy, it's no longer in existence. I don't know what we can do as a government to combat this awful disease that everybody is enduring.
We have really intelligent young people within I have to speak for my community alone. I know there's a lot of young educated individuals within the community. This drug does not discriminate against anybody. These young individuals, they're really educated. They were going to colleges and some of them come back, and they're they have nothing. They have to give their children to their parents because they're hooked on this drug. And today's I know some of them are related, directly related to me. My sister's kids. Not all of them, but I don't even know where some of them are. They could be in the community at one day, then the next day they're gone. But I hope we can look at some find some alternative measures where we can meet these goals of combatting drug use, gangs, and just take the pressure off the RCMP and other resource people. And I believe this government can do it. That's all I have to say. Thank you.
Mahsi. Is there any mahsi for your comments. Is there any further comments? I'm going to go to YK Centre, Member from YK Centre, sorry about that.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman. For sake of time and energy, of course I won't run through all the comments highlighted earlier today by a few of the previous speakers here. But the truth be told is, you know, we talk about these challenges at Justice, and I can tell you being the Member for the downtown riding, it is stressful for many people. And so whether you live on the edge on one side of it or closer to the Ruth Inch Pool or you live on the other side towards the Salvation Army area, I mean, it just seems to be one of the most interesting catchall areas from one end to the other. And by the way, those aren't the exact descriptions of the riding. But I mean, the point being is it really captures the downtown. And many people, you know, whether they live in Northern Heights or they live in houses downtown from where the future proposed Yellowknife Sobering Centre is, or will be, I mean, people are stressed, and they're worried about response times, they're worried about fulfillment of justice mandates, people following through. I mean, the other day I was raising the issues of scooters on roads and sidewalks and, I mean, it makes me frustrated and chuckle when I see enforcement drive by and bicycles and whatnot. We don't even enforce laws now, such as those things are legal. And as a person who's had two young people now they're both taller than me but, you know, when they were both short legs and drove bicycles with small tires, I mean, as a parent, we want them on sidewalks. But the point I'm making is we don't even enforce all our laws and, you know, which often makes me wonder why we even keep them on the books because we're waiting for that one circumstance where we want to hit them with everything.
Mr. Chairman, you know, we see the destruction of neighbourhoods because of drugs and alcohol and drug dealers and people taking advantage of elders and seniors and the outright frustration of the neighbours who are held hostage. You know, somebody buys, you know property values, you know, it's not subjective but it's subjective in the context of where you live. You live in one neighbourhood, it's you know, that house is worth so much and you live in another neighbourhood, and next door you have problems, it tanks. And you know, we have people who have made life investments into their community, and, you know, it's very difficult to get a response time when, you know, you're complaining about this problem or that problem, and my goodness, I would love to see that SCAN app come into force. I would love to see stronger rules on how we deal with bail reforms highlighted by the Premier. We've heard of I heard it many times about these challenges and I mean, like I say, I see good people in good neighbourhoods having to listen to problems and deal with problems, and their hands are tied. I mean, I don't know what the right answer is, but I can certainly say that one of them has to do with stronger enforcement measures such as, in other words, following through on showing up and charging them who are causing problem. I do not believe for a moment that more charges solves social problems, and I'm not connecting the two, although, unfortunately, the two bleed into each other every day, which is, you know, drugs, you know, lead to one problem, alcohol leads to another, you know, buyers are there, and if people weren't buying, they wouldn't be selling. So when you live in a neighbourhood that has those problems and no neighbourhood downtown is exempt from this. You can say you live on one street, well we don't have problems. No, they've got problems too. So I'm very supportive of any measures that can help support the rule of law. At the same token is I'm very supportive of ways of expanding although I should stress I know this isn't the department but, that said, expanding treatment options and providing avenues for people to find their souls again. And I often refer to them as lost souls that need support in trouble and guidance to find their way home.
The last few years, I had the pleasure of being involved in a restorative justice program. I think that that is a bang up opportunity where you know, where I'd like to personally see that used more, although I'm not involved in the program anymore but I mean, I can certainly see many people who've made some challenges and found themselves in circumstances and, you know, maybe on a good day, they wouldn't have been there, but on a bad day that's where they found themselves. And I can say that there are many other things about giving people opportunity and finding their way with support of others. So Mr. Chairman, I don't want to spend too much time. I do want to stress, though, that the core of downtown is frustrated, and what it needs specifically is a larger presence. And the larger presence doesn't necessarily mean more people arrested but people to be reminded that, you know, they have to be on some reasonable behaviour. Because people live there. They have children there. Families want to do things. And when people leave apartment buildings or condos and feel threatened or unsafe, I mean, it's that's not a win for anyone, really. And ultimately so I was just talking to my colleague from Range Lake. I mean, you know there was a time where I was trying to press and I would certainly like to see this. I mean, I think this is a justice issue, not necessarily a health issue, but, you know, there was a time I was trying to press that we need to put social workers on the street downtown Thursday, Friday, and Saturday night talking to people, trying to give them some guidance and maybe asking, you know, somebody who's, you know, 16 years old who's saying it's 2 o'clock in the morning, what are you doing out, you know, you're up to no good, or people trying to take some level of responsibility. And it's a community problem. I'm not going to say it's just one person. Yellowknife is a big community. And I mean, I grew up in a small one, and I know what it's like being a young person and I'll say full of adventure, and though I can't talk about a few stories due to statute of limitations, but they're going to be funny one day.
But in all seriousness, Mr. Chairman, a greater presence is really if I had an ask specifically at this particular time, a greater presence, that we find a way to put, for example, the RCMP in the community more out of cars, talking to people, you know, whether it's telling a person in front of the Reddi Mart downtown, you know, here's an ice cream, now walk home. You know, it's 11 o'clock, you should be home. You know, somebody who's having trouble, you know, can we call someone and send you home, you know, type of thing. And like I say, a bigger physical presence would go a long way. And by no means have I will advocate for harsher punishment because I think some of these troubled souls in general have their own challenges and our job is to help guide them back to some stability. But to the hard crime folks, we have to find a way because it rots the community. And I'm hopeful, like I said, with the SCAN app coming down the pipe and maybe a larger presence, we can have a more positive influence on our community, which is what many of us need. And I can assure you a guy who knocked down knocked on doors for many years despite the sabbatical, I can tell you it has gotten worse, and our job is to make things better. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Thanks to the Member from Yellowknife Centre. And we'll pass the floor over to the Member of Tu NedheWiilideh, Mr. Edjericon.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman. It was pretty hard sitting up there, sitting back and listening to this issue, the issue of drug addictions that impacts our communities. When I heard my colleagues speak about it, especially George, it really hits home. I know in our small communities, we feel this every day. And even as the MLA and even as a former chief, I've been to many funerals. And when you go to funerals, it's really tough on everybody, especially on the family. And, you know, I don't want to get into the specific details about what happened but I could tell you this: It's all related to the drugs that's in our communities. And I just want to echo my comments I mentioned this afternoon when I did my Member's statement that, you know, I think it's really time now that I think maybe your department could really take a look at what's been said here tonight. And what we're saying here tonight has also been echoed to you by the Circle of Aboriginal Leaders as well and because I talked to them as well. And I think that, you know, this issue, even though that the RCMP may have a different view about the assessments needed for this dog K9 units that is really needed. Yes, we do have it here in Yellowknife but it's getting so bad now that it's I think we're getting really tired of going to the funerals now. And I agree with my colleagues that, you know, it's hitting home. And at what point I mean, every day I drop off my grandson at school, and he's in grade 11 and he's 16 years old, and I often remind him every day, you know, to make the right choices. And so far, you know, we've been blessed. But the thing is that my colleague over there says that drugs don't discriminate, and it's true. It doesn't I see in my community, it doesn't matter who you are. It impacts everybody. So I just want to just keep thinking about I'm going to be putting forward a motion on the K9unit that I would like to see in Hay River. And if the Minister and your department could really take a look at that. And I know when you go to Ottawa, you could probably talk to the RCMP and see what we could do to really lobby to get a new K9 unit stationed in Hay River. It's a start, but right now, as it is, it's a crisis now that's here in our communities. And like I said, I could count how many funerals I have just on that issue alone, and there's too many.
And so anyways, I'm just I'm glad that you're hearing from my colleagues in the small communities, and it's impacting right across the North, and especially here in Yellowknife. All you got to do is just drive down the streets. And every day, we say our prayers and we give our blessings. And I just hope that you as the Minister, I hope you're listening to what we're saying and that, you know, the issue of this K9unit, I think it's really needed. How we get there is we'll have to figure that one out. I'm hoping that you guys your department could take a good look at that and see what we could do, and it's obviously going to have the support of the House here on that issue. So anyways, Mr. Chairperson, that's just my comments. Mahsi.
Thank you to the Member of Tu NedheWiilideh. Do we have do any Members have general comments? Seeing none, does committee agree to proceed to the detail contained in the tabled document?
Agreed.
Thank you. Get the main man here.
Thank you. Committee, we will defer the departmental summary and review of the estimates by activity summary beginning with community justice starting on page 302 with information items on page 304 and 305. Are there any questions?
There's a question there from Member from Great Slave sorry, Member from Frame Lake.
Just getting the clock going there. Thank you, Mr. Chair. Just a very, very quick comment, and I actually don't even need a response to this. I just wanted to note that I was very happy to see I'll wait a second here.
Sorry, Mr. Chair. Actually, I have a question. Noting that the reduction to community justice committees and projects, can the Minister speak to that a little bit?
Thank you. I'm going to go to the Minister.
Thank you. I'd like to hand it to Mr. Bancroft.
To the director.
Thank you, Mr. Chair. And thank you, Premier. The reduction there of $238,000 for grants and contributions is related to the Indigenous justice program. It was the second year of the program. The first year had a higher level of funding to get the program started. It's just a mid agreement reduction. The funding is continuing at a level of $315,000 compared to its original first year level of $504,000. Thank you.
Thank you. I'm going to go to the Member from Frame Lake.
Okay, thank you. And this is, just to be clear, not a reduction in service, it's just the program needed a bit of extra money to bet launched?
Thank you. I'm going to go to the Minister.
Thank you. That's correct. Often there's work that needs to be done to get a program going and so the agreements with the federal government accounted for that, and then the ongoing funding is more reflective of the ongoing needs. Thank you.
Thank you. I'm going to go to the Member from Frame Lake.
Thank you, Mr. Chair. Yeah, I did want to just note that I was pleased to see an increase between the main estimates and revised estimates for the men's healing program noted and that that increase has been carried over. So I don't really have a question about that. I just wanted to state that I'm happy to see that. I do think that's an important program and clearly tied to some of the goals of this Assembly. And so that's all my comments on this page. Thank you.
Thank you. Any further questions? Yes, I have the Member from Range Lake.
Thank you, Mr. Chair. Is this where we would find the funding for the community safety officer program in Fort Liard? Thank you.
Thank you. I'm going to go to the Minister.
