Thank you, Mr. Speaker. My questions are for the Minister of Municipal and Community Affairs in follow-up to my Member’s statement. How long has the Minister been aware of the situation in Fort McPherson? Thank you.
Thank you, Mr. Blake. The Minister of Municipal and Community Affairs, Mr. McLeod.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. We were made aware of it when it was reported that there was some irregular activity going on with some community finances. We were made aware of it, we took the necessary steps that we had to, we appointed a municipal supervisor, and in July of this year we dissolved council and appointed a municipal administrator for the community. Thank you.
Thank you. Is there a limit to the deficit a municipality can incur before the department steps in? Thank you.
Thank you. There is no limit. The situation they faced up in that particular community, the high turnover of SAOs, I think the average lifespan of an SAO up there was, like, six months and no oversight. So that led to some of the problems that they had up there.
With the new accountability framework that MACA has introduced and implemented, we’re believing that’s going to alleviate a lot of that and we’ll be able to identify a lot of potential problems early and take the necessary steps to deal with them. That helps MACA and it helps the community so they’re not so far into a deficit situation. Thank you.
Is the Minister willing to direct his department to work with the hamlet to reduce municipal service rates to levels that can work for everyone? Thank you.
We’ve had a number of meetings up in Fort McPherson. I was up there in July. I met with a lot of community residents. The big concern we heard up there was the rates the elders were paying. We took the necessary steps to reduce the rates for the elders and that was retroactive to April 1st of this year. So we heard what they’ve had to say.
A lot of the issue was the water and sewer, the delivery of water, the water rates were quite low to begin with and they weren’t reviewing them annually and increasing them as their cost of providing the service was increasing. So it went from that to the increase that they had in this past year. So that was a very high increase for a lot of folks up there, but we’ve heard what they had to say and we dealt with the elders’ issue, which we believe from the meeting results that the elders were the most important. Thank you.
Thank you, Mr. McLeod. Final, short supplementary, Mr. Blake.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I know I’ve been focusing on the water rates, but it’s also affecting the sport and recreation. So I’d like to ask the Minister, will the Minister direct his department to implement a five- to 10-year payback plan on the deficit and not a two- to three-year? Thank you.
Thank you. That would be awfully difficult to do because the sooner that they’re able to pay off the deficit, and they’ve already taken some necessary steps in cutting some of the costs to the community, so we’re seeing an effect of that already. So we believe within two or three years they should have the deficit almost off the books. If we were to stretch it out too long, then that may affect their ability to provide a lot of services in the community and you’re going to have to pay it back at the end of the day. So we thought with the two- or three-year payback, with the number of changes that have been made and they’ve been received, but with the number of changes that have been made, we’re starting to already see an improvement in the deficit and the cost of providing the services to the communities such as the water contract. Instead of doing the water contract in house, we went out for tender and there was significant savings there. It’s issues like that, I think, that are going to help the community deal with the deficit and pay down the deficit sooner. The longer we drag it out, the longer they’ll have the deficit hanging over their head.
Thank you, Mr. McLeod. The Member for Inuvik Boot Lake, Mr. Moses.
