Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, my questions are for the Minister of ECE. And first I'd just like that thank my colleague for raising her concerns around this process. And I'm really glad to hear that the Minister's been having lots of ongoing conversations with Fort Smith and with the city. However, Mr. Speaker, I would have to wonder where my consideration was as the first time I heard about this was through the rumour mill and found out along with the rest of the public.
So Mr. Speaker, I have a lot of questions around this.
First off, can the Minister explain what other locations within the city of Yellowknife have been considered and why were they not selected and Tin Can Hill was? Thank you.
Thank you, Member for Great Slave. Minister responsible for Education, Culture and Employment.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker, and I understand the Member's frustration. Sometimes the rumour mill gets ahead of government and before there are decisions made, before all of the steps are followed, that information can be shared. Information gets leaked and so that was the situation. It came as a surprise to a number of people and so it wasn't by design that things were out there in the public before the MLAs were informed.
Really, the team looked at everywhere in Yellowknife. There were some requirements that, you know, were needed. So the space needed to be large enough for future expansion. There's a desire to have a site that would allow for ontheland learning, for cultural spaces, a place that was close to the downtown core, somewhere where all of the, you know, facilities could be located together. So these are some of the requirements that we wanted to have as part of this. And, you know, for perhaps many of the reasons that there's a long history of proponents trying to develop Tin Can Hill, it's because it's a great site. It's because it has all of those aspects. And so it is clearly the most preferable place for a polytechnic university. Thank you.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. That could have been answered in just as an everywhere answer, so I would just ask that the Minister please speed up his responses.
Can the Minister please tell me when the public consultation began?
Mr. Speaker, it seems to be a bit of a habit that things become a done deal before we're ever asked about them. Clearly, my residents were also, my constituents were also very surprised by this decision and now many are worried that they will not have an input and it will all just be lip service. So can the Minister speak a bit to the public consultation process and when is that going to begin? Thank you.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. This is a City of Yellowknife consultation process. From what I understand, it's already began. Thank you.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. So what I hear, then, is that the GNWT and ECE itself did no public consultation before they made their decision to go with this site so I'm really glad to know that our inputs are being considered here.
How much consideration has been given to the fact that the access to this location will be through residential areas that cannot sustain the traffic patterns that a university or college would require? Thank you.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. As part of the facilities master planning, students were engaged, staff were engaged, Indigenous governments were engaged, the city was engaged, and now we are in the public portion that is being run by the city. It's a city process. There will be plenty of opportunity for public input in this zoning process. And the types of things that the Member is talking about right now traffic access. Those are exactly the types of things that this established public process is going to consider. Thank you.
Thank you, Minister. Final supplementary, Member for Great Slave.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, when we're done here, I will forward the email that I received and referred to in my statement about the numerous times that Tin Can Hill has been proposed for development, and it has been shot down by residents. I'm, again, concerned about the waste of money on this project going forward as I can tell you, from what I'm gauging from listening to residents, they do not want it. And for them to not have been asked, for my constituents to not have been asked, is unacceptable. And, again, it's just a matter of this government doing whatever they would like to do. Thank you.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I didn't hear a question there but the asking is happening now. There's actually a process being administered by the City of Yellowknife where public input will be solicited. So that's what's happening. Thank you.
Thank you, Minister. Oral questions. Member for Monfwi.
