Alfred Moses

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Of course, I'm not. I don't think anybody in this House would feel that way, or even agree to that. I think that, as a government, we try our best to house individuals in the situations that were mentioned. We have a homelessness working group that we're working with to address these issues.

In terms of anybody who is in a situation, as the Member had mentioned in her statement, the NWT Housing Corporation has formed a new partnership, called the NGO Rental Partnership Program, also referred to as rapid re-housing, to support the YWCA, the Yellowknife Women's Society...

As the Member knows, the NWT Housing Corporation has been working with the Aklavik Indian Band for a couple of years now in terms of the planning, looking for a lot, looking for where we can put either a new construction or where we can upgrade a current housing unit. As I mentioned, it is a new construction. We will get the materials there this summer. The building, the northern housing unit, should be complete by December of 2018. We will update the Member on a regular basis. We will also make sure that the Aklavik Indian Band does know this. In terms of the contract, I do believe the...

Not here, on the floor of the House, I cannot provide dates. I will look at my schedule and look at the availability of my senior staff who will be able to come in and chat with leadership, not only leadership but also community organizations, any other non-government organizations, as well, that want to participate in creating options. I know that we had the Yellowknife Women's Centre attend a meeting in Behchoko today, actually, and talk about options for Housing First in Behchoko, and we can do something similar in the other smaller communities. Plus, the program that I mentioned, the...

One thing that this government does is it does provide a lot of social supports to residents of the Northwest Territories. It was only an option. I didn't say to go and do it. It is an option for anybody who finds themselves in that situation or needs a little bit of extra help. We do have the Rent Supplement Program, as I mentioned, to help supplement the living costs that are associated with staying in your own unit, or a market unit, and that's something I would encourage.

We're here to help, as a government, whether it's through income assistance, through the programs we have at Housing, or...

First of all, we have done of few things. We have done a Housing Engagement Survey in 2017, and we're going to do another one in January of 2019. With that, we're developing these community housing plans for all 33 communities in the Northwest Territories, and through that survey, what we've developed is we're doing a strategic renewal within the NWT Housing Corporation. We're going to be reviewing all of our NWT Housing Corporation programs, and we're going to be reviewing them for potential improvements, as well as looking at improvements in our homelessness programs. We continue to do...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, I would like to report on the progress being made on the National Housing Strategy.

On April 9, 2018, I, along with my provincial, territorial, and federal counterparts, met in Toronto to endorse a multilateral Housing Partnership Framework. The partnership framework further advances the National Housing Strategy and sets the foundation for federal, provincial, and territorial governments to work together toward achieving a long-term, shared vision for housing.

This endorsement means that we are now moving toward accessing funds beyond the Northern Housing...

In my previous response I did say that we're continuing to have bilateral negotiations with the Government of Canada, so we're hoping that we'll see an increase in the amount of funding that we can disperse out into the communities to address some of the housing needs. However, the current funding that the Member had asked about, it is a flexible fund that can be used for a number of social or affordable housing purposes. We're allocating the funding from the Northern Housing Fund toward the operations and maintenance costs of public housing, and toward the demolition of units slated for...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker, and I do want to recognize Ernie Bernhardt, on another note though, in terms of being a very strong advocate, a coach, a promoter, and helping us revitalize the Arctic sports not only here in the Northwest Territories, but through the circumpolar region, and just thank him for all the work that he does in that area. Thank you, quana.

Right now, we can't really set a timeline based on the resources that some of these communities have. As I mentioned, we have a fire protection action planning tool, as well, that was developed in 2017. It identifies priority activities, monitors progress, works toward a safe, effective, sustainable fire service. We have 13 community action plans under that planning tool.

We will continue to work with the NWTAC LGANT as well as the NWT Fire Association. We will be meeting with them at their upcoming general meeting 2018 to give them an update and see how we can work together collaboratively to...

Right now, it is just the local governments that are responsible. We provide the support. We provide the training, as the Member alluded to in his Member's statement. From May 25th to May 27th, we had a Part I defensive-level firefighter course that took place. I believe there is going to be a follow-up coming in June. We continue to work with all our municipal governments to ensure that fire protection plans are in place for the community, and we do provide the supports.

We also have a community fire protection video as well as a presentation, which we have done in 18 community government...