Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, today I want to talk about concerns I have with the NWT Housing Corporation. It has recently occurred to me that there are so many unresolved questions and issues about the functioning of this corporation/department, that we need to turn some serious attention to its operations. Today, I will just provide a broad overview of the issues, as I see them. I don’t have a lot of detail to offer today, but I have research looking into specific questions for me, and I will also have questions for the Minister at some point in this House.

We vote approximately $30 million per year for the operations of the NWT Housing Corporation. Do these dollars actually go to address what we constantly refer to as the critical shortage of suitable housing in the North, or do they go to a myriad of other activities, most of which, I maintain, are questionable at best and abysmal failures at worst?

How much of our financial resources that we commit to the NWT Housing Corporation go to a bloated, overstaffed headquarters? Why do we need so many people in headquarters? Why doesn’t the number of positions in headquarters go down when the corporation decides to contract functions out? How many initiatives are undertaken by the Housing Corporation without proper budgets associated with them? For example, the Novel project. Were there funds budgeted for travel, consultation, consultants, so that the committee with the responsibility of the Housing Corporation could have input, or is this initiative forging ahead on an ad hoc basis?

We hear that the mandate of the Housing Corporation is changing. What is it changing to? Who is setting the priorities and direction for these changes? What about the housing policies and the rent scale? Why have we never been able to address the hardship that is caused when there are overcrowded housing situations in communities, and employed family members can’t live in a public housing unit with a client without their rent changing to the point of making it impossible for the tenant to pay their rent even on a temporary basis? Yet, we can have people performing illegal activities at a housing unit selling drugs and bootlegging alcohol for which there is no declared income. We are paying their rent.

Hey!

Jane Groenewegen

Hay River South

We haven’t been able to even partially close the gap of free rent for elders over 60 in public housing, and there is virtually no support for seniors living in their own homes trying to maintain independence and make ends meet.

Why are we spending millions of dollars on seniors’ complexes like the one we toured in Tuktoyaktuk that is heated and lit 24 hours a day, seven days a week, costs thousands of dollars to keep the lights on, and no one has ever lived in it? Unless they reprofile the facilities, the same could be said of Fort Resolution and Deline. Mr. Speaker, could I seek unanimous consent to conclude my statement, please?

Speaker: MR. SPEAKER

The Member is seeking unanimous consent to conclude her statement. Are there any nays? There are no nays. You may conclude your statement, Mrs. Groenewegen.

Jane Groenewegen

Hay River South

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Thank you, colleagues. I want to know how the capital money and operating costs of these facilities was spent, and so completely missed the needs of the community. How much did the marketing housing initiative cost? How many units are empty, and how many is the Housing Corporation subsidizing the cost of because they failed to have an accurate business plan or market analysis plan formed before jumping in with both feet?

When was the last time the Housing Corporation performed an analysis of their rent supplement units that were built in communities at 20-year sweetheart deals where the rents are grossly over-inflated? Why is the Housing Corporation always embroiled in controversy over their procurement tactics, making deals, putting out RFPs or tenders, only to turn around and do something completely contrary? Why is the Housing Corporation involved in things like product development and software development, which is far outside of their mandate? If we have a critical housing shortage in the North, how about getting back to the issues at hand: to finance meeting the mandate of the Housing Corporation to provide suitable housing? I have a long list of places where they can start looking for that money. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

---Applause