Caroline Wawzonek

Thank you, Mr. Chair. Mr. Chair, I don't know that I have a bed count necessarily here. I can say that initially the project that this was funding was on an estimate that there might be a 50 bed needed; however, it was determined that 25 to 30 person modular would be reasonable and so the numbers came down and the project was being asked to changed. There are 45 beds currently at Spruce Bough; 25 in it transitional housing. And so this does continue to support those efforts in that regard. With respect to the Salvation Army, again, I don't have the numbers in front of me, Mr. Chair. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I'm always very happy to talk about the Taltson project that we have underway right now. This is a project that is a partnership amongst the GNWT as one member of the MOU, but our other members are the communities and nations that are around the watershed region, so Akaitcho First Nation, Salt River First Nation, and Northwest Territories Metis Nation. We sit regularly. We had a steering committee meeting just before session commenced, and it was an opportunity for us to reaffirm commitment to the project, met with the Canada Infrastructure Bank, in fact, at that time...

Thank you, Mr. Chair. Yes, so a quick response, first, is that this is one-time funding that's going to two organizations. 1.5 -- just over $1.5 million to the Yellowknife Women's Shelter for the Spruce Bough transitional housing services they provide, and $300,000 to the Salvation Army shelter operations. This was money that was otherwise going to be lapsing because of just delays in terms of getting some of the work around transitional housing -- the transitional housing project that had been previously proposed for a site in Yellowknife that apparently there's some zoning challenges in that...

Thank you, Mr. Chair. Mr. Chair, I can't speak to what may or may not have been going on back in 2016. But, Mr. Chair, this is an appropriation that is meant to move -- there was -- sorry, there was some funding that sunset previously in health and social services, and then we are now looking to fund this out of ECE and to step in where the funding was previously sunset to now go from what was a federally funded program in health to a GNWT funded program through ECE. Thank you.

Yes, please, Mr. Chair.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, I'm pleased to have a representative from Yellowknife South acting as a page this week. Naya Nichols is a student at St. Pat's, and thank you for your service this week.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, I wish to table the following two documents: Supplementary Estimates, Infrastructures Expenditures, No. 1, 2025-2026 and Supplementary Estimates, Operations Expenditures and Borrowing Authorization, No. 1, 2025-2026. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, I believe that the Member has overstepped the bounds that there's making inferences here about the Minister's intentions and the Minister's process and what the Minister may or may not be doing, imputing negative motives and a motive that's not present. The notion that she's not working with the Member or the Members of this House is -- in my view, it's not fair. That's a mischaracterization. It's not a characterization of work that's happened on this file, that's been described in this House today, and that we have information, all of us, knowing about the...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I'll try to be brief, Mr. Speaker. I know we were all given some warnings on being so, and I'm probably the worst at that. Well, Mr. Speaker, it's a tricky one. We obviously during COVID saw a number of different types of relief issued in terms of industry specific or sector specific, or aviation sector for example, but also had money that went into the pockets of residents and didn't always find that that was perhaps the best form of providing people the supports that they, in fact, required. So, you know, and then, of course, during evacuation, we were able to bring...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, this recently introduced measure was fairly targeted, and it was temporary. This is intended to be for one year only in the face of $300 million in losses to this industry that keeps people employed in the Northwest Territories. But to be clear, Mr. Speaker, what we did was we did not completely wipe out the fact that the mines are going to continue to pay property taxes. They are just paying a bit less. They were, up to this point, other than pipelines, which had the highest mill rate, the mineral resource sector faced the second highest mill rate...