Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Maintaining Northwest Territories' Housing Stock.
WHEREAS in 1993, the Government of Canada cancelled social housing programs in the Northwest Territories, which built significant local economy and created multiple housing units;
AND WHEREAS the Homeownership Assistant Program resulted in the construction of many new homes across the Northwest Territories, but these homes were built without the required operation and maintenance funding to maintain these homes;
AND WHEREAS the state of the Homeownership Assistant Program units in the Northwest Territories are reaching the end of lifecycle and need complete emergency retrofit;
AND WHEREAS Housing Northwest Territories acknowledges nearly one in four households in the Northwest Territories are in core housing need, and the cost of addressing core housing is estimated at $300 million in capital and $18 million in ongoing operational funding;
AND WHEREAS home inspections are urgently needed to determine the actual costs to address housing repairs and to plan for bringing homes across the Northwest Territories up to National Building Code standards;
NOW THEREFORE I MOVE, seconded by Member for Yellowknife North, that the Government of the Northwest Territories immediately provide funding grants to Indigenous governments that wish to complete home inspections in their region.
AND FURTHERMORE, that the Government of the Northwest Territories provide financial support to Indigenous governments to assist in data collection to support opportunities to leverage federal government funding;
AND FURTHERMORE, the Government of the Northwest Territories provide funding to Indigenous governments in alignment with the Mandate of the 20th Legislative Assembly to ensure sustainable financial resources for housing programs and projects;
AND FURTHERMORE, to facilitate this financial support, the Government of the Northwest Territories enter into a memorandum of understanding with all interested Indigenous governments and bring forward necessary appropriations by the end of the 20242025 fiscal year;
AND FURTHERMORE, that the Government of the Northwest Territories respond to this motion within 120 days.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
The motion is in order. To the motion. Member from Tu NedheWiilideh.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I brought this motion forward as a result of when I was first elected in the 19th Assembly and one of the things that came out of my riding is that housing was a problem. To qualify for a housing corporation program, you pretty well had to shoot an arrow from Yellowknife to hit a board in Lutselk'e and if you hit the middle of the bull's eye, then you could qualify for a program. Well, Mr. Speaker, the policy of the Government of the Northwest Territories just doesn't work for our people in small communities. And as a result of the demand from and hearing back from my constituents in small communities, they've asked me to put together a letter to the housing Minister in the 19th Assembly, and which I did. I put in a letter of about over 120 homes that needed urgent repairs, and I never got a reply back for about three or four months.
And at the end of the day, the letter that I got back was that they're saying that this issue is going to be addressed by the Circle of Aboriginal Leaders. And so that was a response to me. So when I go back to my constituents in Fort Resolution who are the elders are asking for help, I had to tell them that, sorry, the response this is my response back from the Minister, and this is what I had to tell them, what the results were.
But regardless, Mr. Speaker, in the Northwest Territories, prior to 1993 the housing corporation did a really good job in getting money from CMHC and the federal Government of Canada, and they built anywhere from four to 500 homes a year and throughout the Northwest Territories, and that included Nunavut prior to 1999. And so what's happening now, the average life cycle of a house is about 50 years, and before it needs work. But right now, in small communities, we have a lot of houses that are 30 plus years old and in dire need of complete retrofit.
If we don't address this issue now, then the problem is going to come is when these homes is going to be condemned. And they could be condemned by the fire marshal. And if that happens, then it only adds to the overall housing crisis we have here in the Northwest Territories.
So I took it upon myself to recognize that the housing corporation doesn't have the money today to address these homeownership repairs in small communities throughout the Northwest Territories. And so what I did was I put together an idea, thinking outside the box and trying to figure out a way how I could work with Housing NWT and the Minister, trying to figure out a way to resolve this issue. And the only way I could think of it is because I know that they don't have the money to deal with this issue, I thought maybe okay, well let's try something different. I got about 540 homes in my riding, and there's about 200 public housing units. And so the rest is we could call them private homes. Those are the ones that I want to look at. And if I'm able to get some SEED money from the housing corporation to undertake the inspections of these units and determine the actual cost to bring up these units to National Building Code standards and then put it all together. And if I'm able to work with the Minister of housing corporation with the Akaitcho Territory government and the NWT Metis Nation in Fort Resolution, we could do this collectively.
And I got support letters from them already. My letters are sitting in the Minister's office right now for support to undertake a project like this. But this motion that I have in front of us now is going to be identical for other regions in the Northwest Territories to step up and maybe work with the Housing NWT because this problem in my riding of Tu Nedhe is no different than all of other five regions in the Northwest Territories. It's the same issue. So the housing issue's not going to go away.
So speaking to the motion, this is something that is needed. When I put my letter together on March 15th, 2024, outlining my priorities for my riding, again housing is still the number one issue. And it turns out now that the priority of this government is housing is the number one issue. So I'm being proactive, trying to think outside the box and put together if we work with the Housing NWT in partnership with Indigenous governments, then we all can hit the bull's eye together. So that's something I'm thinking outside the box. So, Mr. Speaker, to the motion, that's why I brought this forward. Thank you.
Thank you, Member from Tu NedheWiilideh. To the motion. Minister of Housing NWT. Member from Yellowknife North.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. And just briefly here, I want to thank the Member for Tu NedheWiilideh for bringing this forward. I think it really aligns with the Assembly's priorities and some of the intentions stated in the business plan, and I just wanted to bring up those.
So something that was pointed out by one of my colleagues, as we discussed this, that I think is a good thing to consider as we move forward with trying to get more, you know, home inspections, really understand the need for housing repair and maintenance and take that to the federal government, but was she was saying that the danger of providing home inspections or audits, if there is not an intention to actually make sure that those repairs get fixed, then you might be raising people's expectations or sort of giving them false hope and, you know, they're opening up their homes and their privacy to have someone go in and go through and decide what all the repairs are needed and then might get very disappointed if those repairs don't happen. So I want to make sure that we put the control in the hands of community governments, Indigenous governments, and ensure that people are aware of what we're trying to understand better the need and take those funding requests to the federal government, or wherever funding might be available, and just make sure that people are fully on board and understanding what we're trying to do. And I do hope that we can make significant progress in addressing the repairs, the maintenance that does need to be done. There's a huge need, as my colleague from Tu NedheWiilideh was talking about, so I do hope that we can really make significant progress on that but that we also don't give sort of unrealistic expectations to people everywhere that they're immediately going to get everything fixed. I want us to chart out a plan and make sure that we are doing it thoughtfully and diligently in setting out the pathways or the funding that will help us get there. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
Thank you, Member from Yellowknife North. To the motion. Minister of Housing NWT.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Again, I want to thank the Member for bringing this motion forward today and acknowledge the importance of this topic. Meaningful partnerships with Indigenous governments are critically important in addressing the housing needs of NWT residents. Housing NWT will continue to work closely with other government departments as well as having a conversation with Indigenous governments about what is needed in their communities to ensure good data about the investments required for various housing needs.
In the Housing NWT business plan, Housing NWT intends to work with a nationallyaccepted housing needs assessment template to complete an assessment of all housing needs throughout the NWT and do so in partnership with Indigenous governments, community governments, and in addition working with the Member and his colleagues. Noted in the meetings in the MLA’s riding, Housing NWT will commit to working with Indigenous governments to assist them in securing funding to address housing priorities in their regions.
I look forward to providing an update on all these efforts as part of our written response to this motion. Cabinet will abstain from the vote on this motion and will provide a comprehensive response to the House within 120 days as requested by the motion. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
Thank you, Minister of Housing NWT. To the motion.
Question.
Question has been called. All those in favour oh sorry, Member from Tu NedheWiilideh, you have the right to conclude the motion, sorry.
Yeah, thank you, Mr. Speaker. And I want to thank my colleagues and also the Minister for your response, and I think this is a good opportunity to understand that working outside the policy of government and coming together on a common issue, especially if it's a priority of this government, and I look forward to working with my colleagues to look for solutions, and I thank you for giving me your support on this motion. Mahsi. And I'd like to ask for a recorded vote too as well. Mahsi.
To the motion.
Question.
