Shane Thompson

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, Strategic Oil and Gas Limited has been under receivership since 2020, and the receiver is legally responsible for managing the site and all regulatory requirements. The receiver reports to the Alberta Court of King's Bench. The land and water board approved conceptional closure and reclamation plan in 2020. A revised closure and remediation plan with other work at the sites is required by June of 2024. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I'm going to take 16 minutes and 5 seconds to answer this question. I guess I can't. Mr. Speaker, phase 1 of the environmental assessment site assessments were completed on 20 wells. Inspection of the sites were conducted by GNWT and OROGO. Most of the production and significant discovery licenses have been surrendered. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, due to this fire season, we actually brought ten retirees back in. Seven of them were Indigenous people. So most of these people, actually of those ten, were incident commanders. So they were actually the ones that were working on the fires. They were the ones giving the direction, how they were going to fight the fires. So we were able to do that. But I had an opportunity to talk to one in Fort Smith and a couple in Yellowknife and as well as one in Hay River. And I talked to them about the work there. And they appreciated that, you know, that they were...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker, and I thank the Member for the question. NWT fire crews type 1 firefighters, we had 34 crews, which is 12 person crews, for 136 extra firefighters, EFFs were 324, for a total of 460. So if you look at the breakdown of Indigenous populations of the BeauDel was 89 percent. Deh Cho was 100 percent. North Slave was 100 percent. Sahtu was 99 percent. And the South Slave was 97 percent. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, I have a return to oral question asked by the Member for Monfwi on September 27th, 2023, regarding fire management policies effect on Indigenous culture.

The Department of Municipal and Community Affairs is in the process of gathering information from departments, community governments, and other jurisdictions on the actual costs to date. Anticipated projections of the evacuation and fire mitigation measures will be reported to the finance management board in the Standing Committee on Government Operations on a quarterly basis. Until this information is...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, I must apologize. This reply to the Commissioner's address is going to be a bit all over the place, and I ask my colleagues for their patience.

Mr. Speaker, much has been said about the response to this year's unprecedented wildfire season. Many people across the NWT have recognized the dedication and hard work of everybody involved in protecting our communities, residents, and critical infrastructure, and many Members of this House have expressed their gratitude during the final session of the 19th Legislative Assembly. I want to begin by acknowledging that...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, as I said, I think it was his first question, we will address the part of What We Heard report will be provided. We will also put it on our website. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, in developing the guidelines, input was provided by several academic arsenic researchers, a health risk expert with the Giant Mine Oversight Board, and the GNWT departments. GNWT staff will continue to discuss the guidelines with land and water boards as part of the current public engagement process. Public comments and concerns will be addressed in a What We Heard summary report. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Revisions to arsenic criteria were undertaken through a structured and scientific risk assessment process to determine approximate background criteria based on the evaluation of new data and methodology since 2003. This process includes assessment of human health risk, and it was concluded that these levels of arsenic are safe for Yellowknife residents. Human health risk assessments look at all exposure pathways. Examples include how people use the land and where they can get their food, whether it is from the land or grocery store. And these are all factors that...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, the public engagement period for this guideline was opened on August 4th, 2023, and has been extended until October 15th, 2023, due to the evacuation. The standard GNWT engagement period is between four to six weeks. Given the evacuation, the department has extended this engagement timeline just well beyond the sixweek period. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.