Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I raised concerns with regards to security at the seniors home in Fort Providence. My questions are to the Minister of Public Works and Services. Currently I wanted to ask the Minister if, within his portfolio, he’s become aware of an assessment of the seniors home in Fort Providence and the deficiencies including security considerations. The building was constructed in the mid-70s. I just wanted to see if there’s been an assessment of the building including perhaps an eye of assessing the security for shortcomings as well. Mahsi.
Thank you, Mr. Nadli. The honourable Minister of Public Works, Mr. Beaulieu.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. The Fort Providence Senior Citizens Home is definitely in the inventory of government; however, it is in the inventory of the NWT Housing Corporation. I believe that the Housing Corporation does work with the Dehcho Health and Social Services Authority to provide some services. The senior citizens home in Fort Providence is not a long-term care facility. It’s an independent living facility. I’m going to have to get some information from the Housing Corporation on what type of security is provided to the residents there. Thank you.
Recent efforts have indicated because of the age of the facility which was built back in 1970, obviously this government will not make an effort to replace it, but make an effort to renovate it. Recently there was review of request for proposal submissions to renovate the facility as early as January 23, 2015.
Has a contract been awarded and when can the community expect an effort to make improvements to the facility? Mahsi.
The senior citizens home in Fort Providence does have a live-in caretaker who is on shift during the evening from 10:00 until 3:00 at night which provides some security. During the day, Fort Providence has some home care workers who do go into the facility. The home care services are provided primarily by nurses who come into the home and support from other professionals such as physicians and occupational therapists from time to time that go into the facility.
As far as the reconstruction or renovations needed at the home, I’m not aware of the status of that particular project at this time. Thank you.
I’d like to thank the Minister for making an effort in trying to reply. Initially I wanted to ask the Minister of the Housing Corporation, but obviously he’s not here.
My other question is with the budget plus the efforts of this government, there seems to be maintaining the status quo of the health and social services programs. We have an increasing aging population of people who want to continue living in their communities and in their homes. The Department of Health and Social Services has made efforts to maintain the status quo. The real effort should have been perhaps to increase and enhance the Home Care Program, so ideally you have health care professionals working with a team of local people to provide services to elders in their homes.
With that in mind, would the Minister agree to support the community’s desire to elevate the seniors home in Fort Providence from an independent care facility to specialized care, a Level III? Mahsi.
I’m just trying to get up to speed on the situation over there. The senior citizens home has gone through some review and there has been the determination that more services could be provided. The Housing Corporation has issued a request for a proposal for a design required for the changes that are necessary. At this time, the Housing Corporation is looking at the RFP submissions. We were hoping that sometime close to the end of last month they would be able to review those proposals to see how they were going to proceed with any design changes that may be necessary to accommodate the people at the senior citizens home in Fort Providence. Thank you.
Thank you, Mr. Beaulieu. Final, short supplementary, Mr. Nadli.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I wanted to understand the Minister of Public Works and Services in terms of the aging inventory of capital assets that the government maintains throughout the communities. In this particular instance, we have an aging seniors home. There have been efforts to perhaps renovate it.
What is the policy of this government, especially the Department of Public Works and Services, of these aging buildings? Do they become, at some point, just not usable and the government has to demolish it? At what point would the government engage with the local community to determine the fate of these buildings? Mahsi.
Most of the buildings designed in the communities right across the Territories that are owned by the government usually go through a retrofit during their mid-life. The retrofit is designed to double the life of the facility at that point. The funds that go into the unit are looked at for amortization. We re-amortize the building to the end of the building. After that reaches the end of its life, the government will do an evaluation and at some point determine the building goes beyond economic repair. Once a unit is beyond economic repair, then we go through the regular disposal of that asset. We use a policy that Public Works has where we offer the building to other agencies or other departments that may want to use it, or community agencies for disposal one way or another. That is the process. Thank you.
Thank you, Mr. Beaulieu. The honourable Member for Mackenzie Delta, Mr. Blake.
