Shane Thompson

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, I rise today to speak about this summer's devastating wildfire season that affected a majority of Northwest Territories residents. Territorial emergencies began in May and ended in September and saw a total of 12 communities impacted and roughly 70 percent of all NWT residents evacuated from their communities.

I understand how stressful these emergency events must have been for residents. I was an evacuee myself in the spring of 2021 and understand the challenges and the anxiety that these situations bring. There are also challenging days ahead as many of...

Yes, thank you, Mr. Speaker. I can't speak for Cabinet. That's the Premier's role and responsibility. But what I'm saying, my personal, opinion is that the next Assembly, the next Cabinet, the next AOC sits down and has that conversation. If they feel it needs to be led by X, then great. I agree. The next Assembly needs to do that. And it's not going to be a Cabinet or AOC directive. I believe it should be the collective when they meet at the very beginning when they talk about some of the mandates that they need to do, some of the things that they need to task the next Assembly to get done...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, I've had conversation with the Member about this very topic. So Department of ECC is going to be doing what we consider our part of the afteraction review. Each situation and then an overall. Then Municipal and Community Affairs was going to be doing an independent, getting a person to go out there, and it's going to include general public, Council of Leaders, Regular MLAs, Cabinet Members, whoever wishes to talk about that. However, I have had conversations with this House here and talked about the opportunity and I think the Member talked about the...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, when the Member asks, yeah, no, it would be great to well, one Minister can answer the question. That would be great if we got all those questions so that we can get that information. If you ask me a question about infrastructure, I'm not going to be able to give you that information unless I get the question ahead of time. And I understand, and it's prerogative the other side to give the questions and not give the questions, to do that. So I appreciate that, but if you ask the question it's going to be multiple departments, and if I don't get it ahead of...

I'll answer the first question. If the Member wants to come sit over here and deal with these disasters, I'm more than willing to sit over there and ask the questions. But saying that, Mr. Speaker, we have been working with Paradise Gardens residents for over a year on their options under DAP and provide and prior to the fire wildfire event, I had written to them to clarify what is available to them under DAP. We are aware that people are in process of making their own personal decisions about their next steps, including whether or not they want to rebuild in Paradise Gardens. MACA staff are...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, Municipal and Community Affairs is using this section of the DFAA as part of its approach to the 2022 flood recovery and supports to those impacted. As part of its claim to eventually be submitted for reimbursement from Canada under its Disaster Assistance Program, the GNWT intends to seek reimbursement for mitigation costs used towards relocation as an innovative recovery solution under the DFAA section 3.4.1 to assist individuals with relocations where mitigation on their existing properties is not feasible. Like many others, department staff were...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, Melvin Sake was born on April 21st, 1996, to Willy and Rose Sake in Fort Providence, NWT. This is where he was raised until the family moved to Mile 80. Then the family moved to Hay River and on to Fort Smith. During the move to Fort Smith, he'd attended school in Breynat Hall. He stayed in school until grade 7, then he moved to Jean Marie River, the home community of his father. Melvin liked to spend a lot of time with his father in the bush. This is where he enjoyed being especially at the family's cabin that he helped build on Sanguez Lake. Just his time...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, I wish to table the following two documents: Conference of Management Authorities Species at Risk Annual Report 20222023; and, the NWT Species at Risk Annual Report 20222023. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, I can tell you that we've got numerous phone calls from the Members, including Members from on this side, that had residents that were didn't get their information. We then worked with them to get on those flights. Yes, we heard some of the challenges that were there and we were trying to get people on those flights. We also had people that showed up here without telling us, and we were looking for them too. So we did have staff there that we were working on that.

As for coming up with another program, we have our bailiwicks of our options available to us...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Yesterday it was said in the House that we were telling people to get out on the planes, get the planes going out there. This is the communication that we sent out: If it's safe for residents who have vehicles and are available to drive, to start evacuating now. If there are any smoke conditions, residents evacuating by the highway will be escorted from Yellowknife through active fire zone. Air evacuation is scheduled to begin at 1 p.m., Thursday, August 7th, 2023. Only residents who do not have the option to leave the area by road are asked to register for evacuation...