EdinburghNLP/nunavut-hansard-plusplus huggingface dataset:
I would be interested to learn how the discussions are going with the Government of Nunavut and the City of Iqaluit in terms of their participation on this advisory committee in the next 6 months to a year before reconvening again next year.
Those are my comments for that page.
This was not a question.
I had a follow up to that also because it raises again the opening remarks on that page.
There are other Nunavut communities besides Iqaluit that would love to see very healthy chunk of capital. No strings attached kind of a fund.
I really think that during the last three years anyways it has hamstrung the communities’ infrastructure funding that they needed at the expense of a tax base community that enjoys the extra monies.
I often wondered about it mainly because prior to the vote on division as well as the headquarters, Iqaluit was not a healthy community because it was under the public administrator and I really believe that it was mainly political that the community, the City of Iqaluit, the Town of Iqaluit was reinstated back, the Council, mainly due to the proposal for the headquarters location.
And financially, I don’t believe the Town had recovered as the public administrator stated at that time about the situation.
I think it is a fact that the government admitted that the City was unable to carry out tax based revenues to cover their requirements and the Government of Nunavut had to come up with a $32 million fund over six years to deal with this stuff. The minister must be able to say, which she does note for the smaller communities, that they would have to live within their means.
Can you make sure as minister that this is the case, as a minister that you recommend to the Cabinet that the City of Iqaluit will have to live within their means as well like other Nunavut communities?
Either the community is a tax base, or it isn’t.
But, certainly the town can recommend itself that they decertify themselves as a city.
And also, if the public administrator can decertify them as a town, the town could decide also that they cannot live within the means of the limits of the tax status, and then they can take some recommendations themselves.
They shouldn’t be looking with both ends out and say we’re doing a great service for the people of Nunavut. But, that’s my point.
The other point that I have is that we’re making quite a bit of a contributions to the city programs, Gas Tax fund as well as the new deal for cities contribution, as well, MRIF.
Government of Nunavut significantly carries those capital works.
I want to follow up with the Member from Cambridge Bay, alluding to how the capital works and all are carved out, assigned. Certainly I think the minister and her staff has significant influence how this capital works funding is spent or distributed to categories of programs that require funding.
One area that I find that doesn’t appear to be in any strategic screen of Nunavut is the municipal roads, whether or not they are the responsibility of transportation, it doesn’t matter. But, the roads must have long term support.
I was in Northern Quebec for two weeks some time in October.
The small community of Salluit is enjoying a paved road all the way, I believe to the airport.
And, not only that community, but most of the larger communities and the small communities are on a strategic plan so eventually their community roads will be paved, mainly for the purpose of control of dust in town to the public.
Has that ever been raised in the department?
If so, what can come out of this, the desire to have paved roads in small communities?
In regards to the Gas Tax and the Municipal Rule Infrastructure Funds, those pots of money can be used and I had a meeting with my Canadian counterpart, and I believe that we can access monies that would provide those types of infrastructure in the Nunavut communities.
Yes, Mr. Chairman, I think that would be great if that can be looked into, but I would like to ask the Deputy Minister whether or not that has ever been considered as a possible investment for the roads in Nunavut communities, like we did so in Iqaluit and is being done very substantially in the Northern Quebec Region?
Is that the kind of thing that might go far in the future for federal programs?
Chairman (interpretation): Thank you, Mr. Curley. Mr. Rich.
The question of roads and maintenance of roads is one that comes up, the member is quite right, quite regularly in our discussions with hamlets.
We have raised it in our discussions with the federal government.
To date, the one avenue that we’ve had is the Municipal Rural Infrastructure Fund, which does have in it the category of funding for access roads. And not precisely what you’re talking about but at least it does help and that is certainly an issue in many communities.
That is there and is eligible for funding. The reluctance that we have been running into with the federal government for funding is the fact that right now the infrastructure funding is tied to the Kyoto Protocol in reducing emissions so they tend not want to use it to do road work within communities. However, we have raised it and we’ll continue to raise it.
So we are also hopeful that having the MRIF funding and the Gas Tax funding and those other things, that it would free up more of the Government of Nunavut money which then would be available to use for road work.
Chairman (interpretation): Thank you, Mr. Rich. Mr. Curley.
That is a very helpful response. I appreciate your answer. I do realize that Northern Quebec probably enjoys more sources of funding as they are governed by the Province of Quebec.
But it would worthwhile to find out how their own northern communities are developed, especially their road programs if they have them.
Would the Deputy Minister find out exactly how they are funded, that’s something that we may want to learn from if that is possible.
Mr. Rich: Thank you, Mr. Chairman. We will certainly explore that item.
I do know with the discussions with some of the officials there that some of their funding for roads that connect communities of course comes from Hydro Quebec and from the companies working on that. So they have access to quite a bit of funding for that. In addition to that we will certainly pursue the issues with them about what other source of funding goes with that.
Chairman (interpretation): Thank you, Mr. Rich.
We are on J-6.
Qikiqtaaluk region not Northern Quebec.
Mr. Curley (interpretation): I’ll just say thank you. I got my response.
Mr. Chairman, I have a question on that block funding agreement. I know that over the last number of years infrastructure in our capital has been a concern. If you look back to the creation of Nunavut and all the infrastructure funding that was pumped into Nunavut, that is too bad that there were a lot of things that were overlooked like a lot of the social infrastructure wasn’t looked at and some of the problems that would occur as a result of Iqaluit being the capital and even the municipal services like the roads and the utilidor and the water and sewer delivery.
A lot of those things were overlooked and at the time my understanding of it was the City was in a situation where they would be able to leverage funding if they were given some kind of block funding agreement with the government. Also it is my understanding that all of the projects that were identified between the City and the government were projects that were to be approved by the government. I know with myself and my former colleague Ma’naman from Qamanijuaq who used to sit beside me here use to say, there would be a lot of scrutiny as far as keeping an eye and monitoring and evaluating the program in light of past experiences.
I just want to ask in this block funding agreement, from the department’s stand point, has the City been living up to their end of the bargain and doing what they are supposed to be doing throughout the life of this agreement.
Chairman (interpretation): Thank you, Mr. Tootoo. Ms. Minister.
Thank you for that to the member.
Infrastructure pressures on the city are extraordinary and require a flexible agreement and also the city contributes to all projects. The fund they have provides the city stability to allow them to make long-range decisions and all projects are approved by the minister.
Chairman (interpretation): Thank you, Ms. Minister. Mr. Tootoo.
I know a few years ago around the time when this agreement was brought forward, one of the things said was that it could possibly be a template, or a model to be used by other communities, if they chose to go tax-based.
I know at that time I believe your community of Rankin Inlet was looking at going to a tax-based community.
Whereas my colleague pointed out earlier, that since the taxpayers of the community pay for most of the services offered by the government, in turn they are able to work out others kinds of different arrangements, like this block funding agreement, you said that allows them to leverage other funding and create plans.
Hopefully, we can see other communities move forward in this model and take charge of their own destiny.
If you look at it here, our city council, I think that about 80 percent of the funding that it gets or it needs to operate its services, come from the taxpayers of Iqaluit.
If we could point out that the education tax that was being collected by the taxpayers here in Iqaluit that went into general revenue, was our contribution, whether knowingly or not, to the rest of the territory.
I am glad to see that go over.
I wish it would have went towards education in Iqaluit.
Given the nature of the agreement, is the department satisfied with the progress that the city’s been making when they are monitoring this agreement?
Also, if that is the case, if there is some type of extension to continue looking at the option of looking at some kind of similar type of situation, if the city chooses to see it that way?
It won’t happen overnight but over time, I am confident that it will get there.
For instance in Iqaluit, the first few years were slow and now they are getting a lot better.
We have a draft paper on moving to tax-based on status that may allow others to move into a tax-based status.
I appreciate that, and I look forward to it.
I am sure, as her worship, Ms. Sheutiapik, and the councillors here would probably say that it is much better in making those decisions in your own community as to what projects you want to proceed with happening, instead of someone sitting somewhere else making that decision for you.
I just want to go back to the evaluation and the monitoring of the whole agreement.
Is that something that’s going satisfactorily, as far as the department is concerned?
May I have my Deputy Minister to respond to that?
At the staff level, we meet almost monthly with the City to review projects in progress. I can certainly say that in the first couple of years of the contribution agreement, work was very slow. There were capacity challenges in the City in terms of having the right staff and having staff available; having some difficulty in filling positions as we all have at times in professional positions.
Over the last two years, the work in the City on the part of the capital plan has progressed quite rapidly and they have quite a few projects underway now. So, I would say that our early concerns about the slowness of the projects have now largely been addressed and the City is moving along effectively on the capital plan.
I should also say they faced some particular challenges; the member outlined what some of those challenges were and we would agree with those challenges. They had some difficult choices to make about the approach that they would take, for instance, with their waste water treatment plant and facilities; they have addressed that and they are moving along quite rapidly now.
Chairman (interpretation): Thank you, Mr. Rich. Mr. Tootoo.
I know that our colleague from Cambridge Bay pointed out that this agreement is coming to an end. I’m just wondering if the City so chooses to do so with the government, and they probably would be willing to look at trying it again; extending the agreement.
It’s too early to commit to another agreement for Iqaluit. It also depends on federal funding too and also, it’s an FMB decision.
I certainly look forward to finding out whether or not they are planning on renewing a similar agreement for the future.
My next question has nothing to do with the contribution agreement, but there’s something...I know that earlier on during the year, I talked to different people around the City and one of the things was that the City actually set up a task force or a working group on is the idea of looking at a deep sea port facility here.
And that’s something that I don’t see in any of the Community and Government Services capital or the Transportation capital, but I’m just wondering if that’s something that would flow through this department that the City would show us to move in that direction, or if it would be through another department.
Hon. Levinia Brown (interpretation): Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I would like to thank the member for bringing up those various issues.
In regard to the deep sea port fisheries, I believe it’s the Department of Economic Development and Transportation.
Chairman (interpretation): Anything else, Mr. Tootoo?
Capital Planning and Technical Services. Details of Capital. Grants and Contribution.
Qikiqtaaluk Region. Total Qikiqtaaluk Region. $4,503,000.
Chairman (interpretation): Turn to page J-7. (interpretation ends) Grants and Contribution.
Looking at this page, for the seven communities in the Kivalliq Region, Rankin Inlet is going to try to have a certain amount of money for capital spending for those seven communities and it has been ongoing like this for quite some time, even the offices of Community and Government Services in Rankin Inlet seem to have so many people working over there and they have to look after everything.
Looking at the $272,000 for the Kivalliq Region, it doesn’t seem to be enough. It just seems like it’s just for a half time employee. There is not really enough for that region.
Like, they didn’t seem to have enough money to buy capital items.
I just don’t know what the employees of Community and Government Services are going to do with that small amount of money. Is there any funding on the side besides this $372,000?
Hon. Levinia Brown (interpretation): Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I will get my Deputy Minister to respond to that question.
The funding you see here reflects only special funding that is available under the capital budget for distribution to various communities in the region.
It’s not the funding that the department goes on, like for instance, for its normal operations and maintenance in terms of operations. So, it’s only specific capital funding. The three are regional block funds, which provide some additional capital funding for urgent needs in the communities and the region.
The mobile equipment repair, which again, is a small fund which is available to help out when there are particular conditions or particular issues that arise. In addition of that, of course, each hamlet has its own operations and maintenance funding that comes as part of the municipal funding program.
So, this is just really special capital funding that is available each year for urgent or emergency situations.
Yes, I understand what the deputy minister is saying.
Thank you for the clarification, but what I’m talking about is capital expenditures only. I’m not talking about the operations and maintenance part of the budget. I will have more questions later on, looking at the other regions that are going to be expending capital money.
There is a huge amount of money that is allotted to other regions but the Kivalliq Region doesn’t seem to have that much money. It seems like, looking at the figure, I’ll just leave it for now but I will have more questions as we continue.
Chairman (interpretation): Thank you, Mr. Alagalak. We’re on page J-7.
I just want to ask while we’re here before we go into the other part where it has the other capital projects on there, when the department is administering the projects for another department for capital stuff, would that show up in this section, or later on in the other section where it shows specific projects?
Chairman (interpretation): Thank you, Mr. Tootoo. Madame Minister.
Yes, the question of the member, there will be some money allotted in Economic Development and Transportation and Justice.
When we were reviewing the Department of Health capital budget, I was asking some questions in relation to the health facility in Rankin Inlet.
I was told by the minister and the deputy that it was Community and Government Services that was administering that project.
So I am wondering if this page is the appropriate page and I’ll ask that question or the questions on that or wait until we get to the project by project description for the stuff in the Kivalliq region.
Chairman: Thank you, Mr. Tootoo. Madam Minister.
I will get my Deputy to answer that question because a lot of it is going to be technical areas.
Chairman (interpretation): Thank you, Madam Minister. Mr. Rich.
The specific capital budget for a project such as the health centres in Rankin Inlet and Cambridge Bay, up here is under the budget of the Department of Health. So the Member is quite right it doesn’t show specifically in here or anywhere.
On the other hand, because we are managing the project, the Minister of Health was quite correct in that we have the specific figures to respond to those questions.
So I guess it is the call of the Chair on where that should be dealt with because those specific budget items don’t appear in our budget.
We are on 2006-2007 Capital Estimates.
Mr. Chair I guess on this one, that I understand that there have been a considerable amount of change orders and some different code changes since then. I think that those would fall under capital total. I am wondering why we are not seeing that in the capital project.
I will get my Deputy to answer to that.
The expenses are under the overall capital budget for the Department of Health, so they appear that way and of course when the project is done they’ll be reported under that project.
I do have the figures or the information the member was interested in, in terms of it and I am asking for direction from the Chair if he wishes to provide that information because it isn’t specifically in here but I did bring that information with me in regards to the change orders etc. on the two projects in question.
Fire away please.
Chairman: Fire away. Mr. Rich.
Mr. Rich: The questions that were raised by the Member with regards to the two health care facilities had to do with change orders and in particular change orders that resulted from electrical and fire marshal code issues.
And if the Chair would forgive me for a rather a lengthy answer here because it is technical subject and I will try and make it as brief as I can.
Healthcare facilities are complex facilities and do not fall under only the regular, like an office building for instance, codes. But they fall more under strict requirement that come from the Canadian Standards Association and they are so called zed codes, there is a category of codes that start with a zed and a numerical designation.
Those are both electrical and fire in nature. And they are specifically intended for health care facilities.
They have to do with things like back-up power and how you hook up oxygen equipment and the particular electrical and fire safety requirements. Oxygen for instance is a fire source or adds to a fire source so you have to take particular care.
It also impacts on how you are going to use the health facilities.
There are three different level of use of health facilities which have to do with the types of programs offered but also get involved if patients stay overnight in the facilities.
Both facilities were classified as CC facilities which are defined as no overnight stays.
But as the program developed the health officials working with us realized that in fact overnight stays would be necessary in the facilities. It was not possible, particularly with our transportation situation, people coming in from other communities. So that required some changes to the code classification that were not there in the original design.
That difference between the two classifications was resolved in stages, as we approached the stage of completion, we were able to determine what was required and those codes and those inspections were done.
To summarize that in the two facilities, if I start first with the Kivalliq Health Centre facility, in that facility there were 34 changeovers, to date, total. The value of the changeovers was $1.4 million, and that is out of a contract value of $13.2 million, so that is about 11 percent of the total value of the contract involved in change orders.
The change orders that were because of that code change, that I mentioned to you, were actually relatively small, their value $171,000, and that was electrical. There was no cost to any change orders that were required for the fire safety changes. So there was zero fire code changes – they were all electrical changes.
So the Kitikmeot Health Care facility, that had a contract value of $11.6 million, change order value was $1 million. That is an eight percent change order value. There were 36 total change orders.
The electrical code changes cost $188,000, and the fire code changes were $89,000. There were a small number of code changes there.
In most cases, when we looked at these types of changes they were not huge. They were, obviously, because of the dollar value that is involved, there were two types of it, some were construction changes, the construction changes don’t cost us because they are things that happen because of the contractor working on it. The contractor agree to the changes and other things that were done, whatever, that required a change, and some were design changes, which were required, as I said, by those design requirements.
So I am sorry, Mr. Chairman, for the long answer. I used my time.
I thank the deputy.
I think that is a good use for this.
This 11 percent, this $1.4 million for the Kivalliq Health Centre, on a normal project, is that something that would be considered high, normal, or low? Just to get an idea.
Hon. Levinia Brown: Again, could you please answer that, Mr. Rich.
Mr. Rich, please.
We normally expect, approximately, ten percent. So the eleven percent on one is within that general range, the 8 percent on the other is, in
fact, better than what we would expect.
The $171,000 on that one was because of the electrical changes, so that leaves $1.2 million of other changes. I just wanted to get an idea of why they needed that amount. That seems like a considerable amount of changes, although they expect 10 percent but $1.2 million is a lot of money extra on something, considering it was already paid for.
I am just wondering if I can get an idea on what some of those changes were?
We are on page J-7, Grants and contributions.
Hon. Levinia Brown: Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I will have my deputy, Mr. Rich to respond.
Chairman (interpretation): Thank you, Ms. Minister. Mr. Rich.
As I mentioned, there are 30 more change orders and they’re fairly technical in detail.
They range on the particular position of piling to facilitate access to a door, that sort of thing.
I don’t actually have the full list of what all of the changes were on it.
They are construction involved changes that resulted as the result of some design changes that were made.
There may have been a change necessitated by an interpretation of the plans for the particular building, whatever.
As I said, 10 percent is actually quite within the normal range of what you would expect.
One also has to remember that both of these are complex facilities that require not just the normal entrance and exit for instance, for people to go into the building, but ambulance entrances, etcetera.
They also have extremely complex heating and air handling systems.