Katrina Nokleby

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. As we revamp our guidelines for our SEED funding, it's now sort of open to all, so that distinction of COVID-related or not is not really relevant. There have been 40 applications for SEED to date, requesting approximately $410,000. Thirty applications have been approved, equalling approximately $220,000 in funding. Two applications have been denied as they did not meet SEED policy criteria. Two applications were withdrawn. Six applications are awaiting review by the regional panels. Applications for the 2020-2021 SEED started being reviewed by the regions on May 13...

What the question was yesterday was: would I make the terms of reference and the membership public? It was not whether I would share it with the Members on the other side of the room. No, this will not be a secret committee. The reason for my response yesterday was that I do not want to tie the hands of anyone prior to even having the first conversation with them. I am open to sharing that and posting that publicly. However, I will have that discussion with the council, and we will move forward as the council sees fit.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. When I made that statement, I was definitely talking about a global situation. That is what I had heard, that, globally, we would be seeing small business fail. Ultimately, my goal is to not have any Northwest Territories businesses fail through COVID-19, but of course, that is going to be a challenge as we are all aware. My role for small business is to be an advocate. I have been doing so. I know there has been conversation around: federal government is doing things and the GNWT is not. I would like for people to be aware that the way that the federal government knows...

There are a number of sub-programs described in the SEED policy that fall under that entrepreneur support category, and there is no specific pot of funding associated with each. Generally, we have $4 million fund that supports economic development in our communities.

This council will be one of three that will be used by Cabinet and all of the government in order to be better informed by the stakeholders as was part of our 19th Legislative Assembly mandate and commitment priorities. We will be working towards making more evidence-based decisions by looking at or getting the feedback from the councils and their inputs, their recommendations. There will be reports provided that will be sent to the executive council and also shared as part of the co-committee that we will be having with the Regular MLAs and ourselves on economic recovery. The plan is to use...

Yes, the website is updated, and things are finalized. We do encourage people to continue to check the website regularly as things do change, and if the situation were to change. We are looking at our fuel supply model. That has definitely been something that has been raised with us. We did have a discussion yesterday about that. I believe the Member had to leave. We recognize that we need to look at our model and ensure that it does meet the efficient supply and resupply of the communities. As well, too, to make sure we have some reliability and redundancy within the models. We are definitely...

No, there were no errors made during the changes to the Fort Smith runway. What I will acknowledge, though, is that it does sound like the engagement was not done properly, or to the liking of the Member and her community, therefore I do commit that the Department of Infrastructure will do better. We recognize that residents and community leaders in Fort Smith are concerned with the recent changes to the runway and the community, so we commit to having a conversation to explain why the runway narrowing happened. The improvements to the runway will position the department to effectively and...

Construction on the project began in May of 2019. Subsequent to that, Northwestern Air Lease, the local air carrier, and the town and local bands raised concerns to the Minister of Infrastructure and in the media. Additional information was provided to these groups to confirm that the concerns they raised were taken into consideration during the planning of the project, and to reaffirm that the level of service at the Fort Smith airport has remained the same. The project proceeded because it addressed the current and future operational needs of the airport.

With the way the structure of the council is working, it is to have the representatives be fed up through the organizations that we have contacted, so the idea being that those organizations will do the work themselves, and then their representative will bring it forward. Through that manner, members of those organizations will input on things within the council. I would imagine, as anything else, I have always expressed that my department is open to any sorts of feedback or comments or conversations, so I would still commit that again. If there are people who have concerns about the council...

We have contacted the organizations that we are using to sort of staff or populate the councils, so the idea is to organize within either this week or by the end of next week a membership meeting with them.