Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, today in my Member’s statement I talked about some of the complexities of eviction notices where public housing tenants are evicted and I proposed sort of some of the problems in a sense of also presenting a solution whereas if we had someone working with them in an intervention program, we may be able to avoid some of these evictions that end up on the shoulders of some of our NGO organizations.
But, Mr. Speaker, incidentally, as I pointed out, the Department of Health, Department of Housing and certainly the Department of Education...Oddly enough I saw exactly where the problem is. The three Ministers were pointing at each other to perhaps maybe get me to ask the other Minister the question. I think ultimately that’s the problem, Mr. Speaker, but I’ll focus in on the housing Minister because I know he certainly is willing and interested on these types of questions.
So, Mr. Speaker, my question directly to the Minister of Housing on this eviction problem is: What intervention process does the department do in advance of issuing a court order or I should say in advance of seeking a court order for eviction? So what intervention process does that Department of Housing do to help avoid putting a family on the street? Thank you.
Thank you, Mr. Hawkins. The honourable Minister responsible for the NWT Housing Corporation, Mr. Michael McLeod.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, there’s a number of ways we can work with the tenants in our public housing facilities, and we certainly work hard towards making sure everybody is aware of the programs and making sure that they have skills to analyze their fiscal situation. We have courses that they can take; they’re short-term courses, at their convenience, and many of our tenants have been taking us up on it. Many of our homeowner applicants are also utilizing this course so they can upgrade their life skills.
The eviction process is a very lengthy one. It can take upwards anywhere from a couple of months, if it was a fixed term lease, to up to a year and a half if there was a tenant that is on the eviction list and they are in our houses indeterminate. It usually requires three levels from the local housing association or authority to the individual, and in all instances the individual is requested and asked to come in and speak to the LHO. It also involves up to three occasions where the rental officer would contact the individual or the family to meet with them and also to go through the process. Failing all these attempts to rectify the situation, then the NWT rental officer will issue a court order to evict. So it’s a very lengthy process with many steps through the system that could allow the individual or the family to change the situations that they’re in. Thank you.
Well, Mr. Speaker, let me paint a picture. You’re an at-risk family, you’re paying $32 a month, you miss one of the month’s rents and all of a sudden your rent now jumps from $32 to market rent and you start getting letters in the mail and you’re afraid of these letters and all of a sudden the letters keep coming and all of a sudden you’re now getting a knock on the door and you’re being told that you have 30 days to move out.
Mr. Speaker, our tenant officers do not have training in any sort of a social work aspect. So, Mr. Speaker, noting that, these staff are data entry folks, not social workers. So they have a process: pay or get out. So, Mr. Speaker, I’m asking for a little empathy built into this program so we can avoid people being kicked out. So would the Minister look at creating an intervention program where we can either work with our NGOs or have more of a social work component built into these housing officer positions that we can get people on the rails, on track paying their rent, rather than putting them on the street? Would he look at creating that process? Thank you.
We already have that process in place. Our tenant relations officers may not be social workers, but they certainly are trained and encouraged to work with our tenants to provide the financial information, to ensure that our tenants are aware of the risks that are involved by not paying their rent and, Mr. Speaker, I want to assure the Member that we don’t evict somebody for $32 a month non-payment. It’s usually a lot higher than that and we do allow for people to come in and start a repayment plan. That’s available to all our tenants. Many of our tenants that have somehow come in arrears and are struggling to make their payments, we have a recovery plan, we have a system where it will take some work to put it together and they pay their rent and then they pay a little bit towards their arrears. So I think it’s very generous and it’s available for all our tenants. Thank you.
Mr. Speaker, for the record, it was when you miss your $32 payment it then springs into market rent so then you have to pay the full rent, just for clarification. But, Mr. Speaker, the Minister’s briefing note doesn’t talk about real life. The Minister’s briefing note talks about sort of pie in the sky about, well, don’t worry about it, we’ll take care of it and we’ll get them on track. Well, I’ll tell you, it was just a couple of weeks ago I had a family that was catching up to their arrears and yet they got this Supreme Court notice to get out. Lo and behold, MLAs like myself and other MLAs get this phone call at two o’clock or later on a Friday and it’s the last day of the month and we can’t change it.
So, Mr. Speaker, the policy problem starts with the Minister and it goes down through the department. Would the Minister either using staff or create a philosophy or create a policy, for goodness sake, that says as soon as someone misses a payment, we’ll create an intervention program so whether it takes two months or 16 months, that we get people back on the tracks to pay their rent, rather than evict them? Thank you.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. My briefing notes say that the intervention program is already in place. Mr. Speaker, the Member is indicating or alluding to a point that he’s trying to make, that there is no program in place. We do have a very good program in place. It works for the most part. We cannot force people to pay their rent. If they’re going to skip their rent and not try to come forward and meet with us to set up a recovery plan, it’s very difficult for us to deal with that situation.
Also, for the record, the Housing Corporation charges full market rent. The subsidy comes through the ECE. So there are two departments they have to work with, but we do make allowances for people to work themselves out of a situation where it would lead to an eviction and we do have many, many steps that are involved that at any point the individual could sit down with us and sign an agreement or work a recovery plan in place. Thank you.
Thank you, Mr. McLeod. Final supplementary, Mr. Hawkins.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Well, rules of the House stopped me from saying what I really want to say, but the fact is, it’s not true. I can tell you right now, because I have a constituent who was trying to pay their arrears at the Yellowknife Housing Authority and they were catching up and it was certainly within reach and yet they were told that if they didn’t pay it all up by that Friday they were out. And guess what. They got a reprieve for a couple of weeks and then the Supreme Court folks showed up and it was only because there was a mix-up in processing the paper that gave them a couple extra weeks. So, Mr. Speaker, the briefing notes may say that, but I can tell you they don’t. So I ask it this way: Would the Minister have a serious look at this policy and make sure it’s being implemented, if there really is an intervention program? Because I can tell you it isn’t out there and it isn’t working. Thank you.
Mr. Speaker, I can tell the Member that it is out there and it is working. The situation he’s referring to is a situation where the courts have already ruled. That would take approximately a year to a year and a half before we went up at that stage. Once the court has ruled that there is an eviction, it is very difficult to intervene. Up to that point, there are all kinds of opportunity to sit down and work out a solution to stay in a unit and I would be glad to sit down with the Member and explain it to him. Thank you.
Thank you, Mr. McLeod. The honourable Member from Nahendeh, Mr. Menicoche.
