Robert C. McLeod

I appreciate the Member’s tip of the hat. It was some good work done on North Slave’s part to work with his communities to come to a resolution. It’s not something we consider one-off. It’s something that we’d like to do on a regular basis now and I think communities will realize that it’s beneficial to them, too, to work with the corporation and identify land and maybe make land available for units. I think this is going to be an ongoing piece of collaboration between communities and the Housing Corporation. It will be beneficial to both because we want to put the product on the ground and...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, I’d like to use this as an opportunity to recognize the hard work of our Pages. We have two Pages from Inuvik. We have Robyn Rinas and we also have Nicole Ellsworth. I hope they enjoyed their time here. They had an opportunity to see the Legislative Assembly at work and I hope it was a learning experience for them. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Chair. No, Mr. Chair, the numbers aren’t reflected in here. This was a decision that was made. This was already done before we made the decision. So that particular thing may come forward in the form of a supp. Thank you.

I think I’m going to let you try to explain this. Mr. Chair, the Member is throwing a lot of numbers out there. So I think what I’m going to do, and I couldn’t quite understand it and I’m not going to pretend that I did.

You know, my line is that we’re trying to use the core needs survey to identify where we can put units on the ground in the ‘11-12 budget. Obviously the Member feels that there is some issue with the way the numbers are and we just looked in some of the communities… I mean, core need is also affordability and with the economic downturn obviously that has a huge effect on the...

Okay. I got lost here. In the Northwest Territories there are almost 500 on the waiting list across the Territories. So we have a huge job ahead of us. We’re taking little steps here in the city to try and alleviate some of the problem. I couldn’t answer the Member’s question as to why there’s such a huge waiting list. There could be a migration of people into the city. There could be many other reasons. And the economy could have a part in it. But we’re doing what we can. I can assure the Member that we’ll continue to work with the City of Yellowknife and the CMHC on this affordable housing...

I mean, obviously, we’re always interested in doing some research. I mean, you obviously have to try to get the best product on the ground. One of the drawbacks to this particular one was good that people were able to get trained. One of the big drawbacks is you have to make a business case for everything and if it’s too expensive to build, then it is something that we have to take into consideration. If you can get more stick built units on the ground as opposed to log homes, then that is something you have to be aware of. We are always looking for ways to improve the quality of our products...

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. As I stated before, this was one-time funding but we have not closed the door on this. This is money of which there’s been an uptake of right now. We’re more than willing in the future if the program continues to be a success and we find that we do need more funding, then we’ll come back to this forum to request the funding.

Thank you, Mr. Chair. I think the Member said it very well when he first started, when he said the Housing Corporation can’t do everything. That’s a very important comment, especially with the challenges we face right now. We do continue to work with the communities. We’re trying to have community-based decisions. We work with communities with lease commitments. We have communities where we’re leasing space from them. In some communities, a small community might be one building that we’re leasing from them and being rented out. The housing for staff was another one where there was a good...

Mr. Chairman, that is something that we would be willing to look at if the LHOs were willing and able to take on the preventative maintenance part of it. I think that is something that does make sense right now. We do preventative maintenance on the seniors units plus seniors can still qualify for CARE, and many of them have had repairs done through the CARE program. Preventative Maintenance Program is a big one that we have heard some concerns where people coming from out of town have been doing some of the work. This is something that we can discuss with the LHOs and see if they are able to...

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. To the Member’s point, he talks about the local economic development and the Housing Corporation in partnership with the LHOs are some of the biggest employers in the community whether it’s guys doing maintenance or during the summer you can have up to 16 or 17 people if you’re doing a lot of the M and I work yourself. So we contribute quite a bit in that regard. The local materials, I think I made reference to yesterday, were possible. We’d love to use local materials for construction, however they do have to meet a standard and if those materials were to meet the...