Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, in my Member's statement I spoke of the core needs for housing for the Northwest Territories. I would like to ask the Minister responsible for the Housing Corporation if there will be a plan to reduce core need presented to the Assembly in the near future. Thank you.
Minister responsible for the NWT Housing Corporation.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Yes, Mr. Speaker, in 2017 the NWT Housing Corporation did seek feedback from the residents and our stakeholders through our housing engagement survey. We did hear from our residents on what is needed in all of our communities. Further, specific actions to address core needs were detailed in the Towards Level Ground publication, which also includes costs by initiative. This government is committed to decreasing core need by 250 households per year, and each initiative developed under the Strategic Renewal of the NWT Housing Corporation is intended to address the core need.
Some of these initiatives do include seniors aging in place retrofits, our rental supplement program that we have with non-government organizations, community housing support initiatives, a housing support worker pilot, developing community plans with all of our 33 communities across the Northwest Territories, as well as new home ownership programs that we are working on. We are working with our Indigenous governments, with partners to address the core housing need in our communities, and I think that is something that has really taken off during this government, and working with our Indigenous governments and community governments to address this. I will be willing to give more of an update to standing committee and Members and some more detailed programs as we move forward. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
I would like to thank the Minister for that response. We are not seeing the actual work on the ground. Unfortunately, that's lot of good planning, but no action.
Mr. Speaker, when is the NWT Housing Corporation planning to update a comprehensive needs survey? From 2017 to 2018, in the Northwest Territories, there were 1,200 jobs lost, so I'm assuming that that has some impact on the affordability of housing in the Northwest Territories, so I think it's urgent that we do something instead of staying with the 2014 needs survey, that we do something that is current today. So I'd like to ask the Minister when that is going to happen.
I do look forward to working with committee, as well as our stakeholders, on addressing the core housing needs throughout the Northwest Territory. The next NWT community survey will commence in January 2019, and as I mentioned, if the Member does have any specific communities or is saying that work is not being done in some of the communities, if he can let me know a little bit more of the specifics, we can look at addressing it. Like I said, I will give a more detailed presentation to committee, or to Members if they would like, upon their request.
I can provide that information that the Minister is asking for. Mr. Speaker, I'd like to ask the Minister what the target is for core need? Across the country, the core needs levels are at about 12 per cent. We in the Northwest Territories always sit at about 20 per cent, so after years and years of putting $100 million a year into housing, we're still at 20 per cent across the territory, and we haven't moved from there. I don't know, maybe we've gone up, maybe we've gone down, I don't know what has happened since 2014; there is no new survey to indicate that. So I'd like to ask the Minister: assuming that we're working off the 2014 numbers, of 19.8 per cent core need across the territory, what is the target for when you reduce core need by 250 units per year? What is the new target number after that work is done?
As I mentioned earlier, we are committed, this government is committed to decreasing core need by 250 households per year. We have various initiatives that we are doing to address the core needs, whether it's home ownership repairs, new unit constructions, looking at seniors' housing, we're doing a senior housing study as well, but it really takes a really strong partnership with some of our stakeholders, as well as some of our community governments, Indigenous governments, to address this, and also work that we've been doing with the federal government.
Masi. Oral questions. Member for Tu Nedhe-Wiilideh.
Mr. Speaker, I'm glad to hear the Minister speak about work with the community governments. I'd like to ask the Minister if there is a plan to directly fund the Aboriginal governments, or community governments, in order to address core need housing in the communities? Thank you.
As I mentioned, one of the ways we're doing this is through the community housing support initiatives. We do have some really good partnerships with some of our Indigenous governments currently, and we're going to continue to work with them, but we're open to working with community governments as well as Indigenous governments, to see how we can work together to address some of the housing needs that we see in our communities. We are committed, we are willing to meet with our Indigenous governments moving forward. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
Masi. Oral questions. Member for Nahendeh.
