Robert C. McLeod

The quick answer is yes, when a resident applies, we will work with the client to come up with an affordable monthly payment plan, and, if there are some that have entered into repayment plans already, we would expect them to honour it, and this program would apply to them, as well.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. As I noted before, the Property Tax Arrears program is designed to provide a path for residents to address the outstanding arrears. Residents can enter into a repayment plan for the outstanding property taxes, and the interest that has been building up will be forgiven; or, in other words, the resident will not have to pay the interest portion. Residents, we have to be quite clear, have to stay current on their payment plan on future property taxes to stay eligible for the program.

Mr. Speaker, revenue forecasts were developed for the project that were projected to increase over time. Revenue has grown at a pace of around 20 percent a year since the inception of the Mackenzie fibre optic line in 2017, and has met its projected forecast. With the recent approvals related to the Inuvik satellite station, I expect there will be more interest and, coming from small communities such as Inuvik, we see that interest firsthand. Finance continues to work with the federal government on the development of a satellite station facility to further increase revenue. Thank you, Mr...

I would be interested to hear from some of the smaller communities down the valley to see if their services have improved at all. We know of the federal announcement where they have committed a whole bunch of money to improving broadband in northern communities, and I think our service providers up here was able to take advantage of some of that. We own Mackenzie Valley fibre optic line. I think we're responsible for getting it out to pop-out, as it's called in the community, and then their service provider would go from there.

Again, Mr. Speaker, we shouldn't be throwing around promises. I don...

These initiatives, they are related. The Property Tax Arrears program will help residents that have built up appears in the past. It is a time-limited program, however, to deal with these circumstances. Going forward, the standard interest rate establishes a more reasonable interest rate on any outstanding amounts owed to the GNWT in property taxes. These two initiatives taken together should help address the historic problem we have had with property tax arrears. That said, though, residents will have to pay their property taxes, and, if they do not, the arrears will start to grow again over...

We are sending letters to all clients with arrears, and we will provide them with details on applying for the program. We are also doing a communication effort in communities in the general taxation area, and we are working with our GSOs, and they have been trained to help residents apply for the program, as well.

Mr. Speaker, the issue of property tax arrears has often been cited as a barrier for residents trying to purchase land, obtain a mortgage, or access various Government of the Northwest Territories programs. Frequently, a significant portion of these arrears are attributable to interest charged on outstanding debt. The impact of this interest compounds over time and can leave residents with significant challenges to recover.

To address the issue of accumulated arrears, the government has established the Property Tax Arrears Program. This program is designed to provide property tax interest...

I think one of the reasons that they put the tag system in place was a number of years ago, when there was no tag system, there was a large amount of bears that were harvested, and I think there was a belief at that time, and this might have been 10 or 15 years ago, that, had they not put restriction on it, then that might have hurt the grizzly bear population quite a bit more. I think what we are seeing today is a result of some of those measures that were put in place to try to protect some of the grizzly bear population. We would have to work with our co-management partners, we would have...

Again, I would have to have that conversation with the service provider. I am not sure if they have any particular plan for the capital. I have not had those discussions, but I do know that there is some infrastructure that was available. I'm not sure if they have accessed that. I think it's a conversation that needs to be had because I think the incident, the last three incidents, how it can lead for some redundancy, and in the southern part of the Northwest Territories, in particular in the capital. I will commit to the Member that I will have those discussions, and then I can report back to...

My understanding is three of the incidents did not occur on GNWT infrastructure. Northwestel is the owner and operator of the infrastructure associated with these three incidents. We are unable to speak on their behalf. In some cases, and I think the Member mentioned in his Member statement, there are active investigations that are under way.