EdinburghNLP/nunavut-hansard-plusplus huggingface dataset:
As Mr. D’Arcy just indicated, the population growth is a big factor in determining the levels.
To cause no confusion I’ll ask Mr. D’Arcy to go through the process, Mr. Chairman.
Mr. D’Arcy.
I’m not exactly sure what Mr. Peterson is asking us in terms of need, we know if we take Cambridge Bay and move it down into Saskatchewan or to anywhere else in the south that overcrowding need is going to eclipse anybody else in that area, it’s going to be much more so then anywhere.
We are never suggesting that Kugluktuk, Cambridge Bay, Chesterfield Inlet, Resolute Bay doesn’t have a housing shortage and that there isn’t a problem.
The problem is one of supply; and how we to get to that supply which brings us over to the Ten Year Action Plan, in trying to engage the federal government to do that we need, somewhere around 600 houses in the territory a year, and if we ever had the possibility of having hundreds of houses allocated somewhere, the Cambridge Bays, Chesterfield Inlets and Resolute Bays of this territory would certainly figure high on the list of getting units.
As it is right now, we have to deal as everyone knows, with scant resources and use the best information we have to deal with those resources.
Now as the minister and others have said often, we don’t know that the future holds.
We don’t know what is happening in 2006 and 2007.
When we do have a clearer picture of funding availability in the government and federally we should be able to come up with a good plan on how we’re going to assign those assets and I think that is about the best answer I can give at this time, Mr. Chairman. Thank you.
Chairperson: Thank you, D’Arcy.
Mr. Pederson.
Thank you, Mr. D’Arcy for that answer.
I think the concern in Cambridge Bay is that the Housing Corporation is using the information and methodology that will not recognize Cambridge Bay’s pressing need for housing.
I know for a fact, that housing association is undertaking a detailed house by house survey of each house in Cambridge Bay to determine what the occupancy is.
There may be people who were missed in surveys.
There are people who move in and out all the time and I don’t think that information is being captured properly.
I think they’re reacting to your, to the allocation formula, that was used previously to allocate housing in the Nunavut.
The Housing corporation folks are well aware of the problem.
I wanted to talk about staff housing, Government of Nunavut staff housing for a few minutes because I believe the Housing Corporation is responsible for that.
Again, as the minister has mentioned in his comments there is a great need for staff housing.
The Standing Committee recognized that a lot of Government positions are going unstaffed because there is problem with the supply of housing.
In fact, that might be a factor in determining whether we have nurses and doctors in Cambridge Bay to open up the hospital.
I wanted to ask about the minister about the Government of Nunavut Staff Housing Policy.
How are the various departments, how does his corporation use that policy to allocate staff housing within Government of Nunavut within the communities that have staff housing?
The allocations for staff housing are done on a regional basis. So there’s an Allocation Committee in Rankin Inlet, Arviat, one in Cambridge Bay, for the rest of Nunavut there’s one in Iqaluit, and there is one in Cape Dorset to handle the rest of the Baffin region.
The positions that are vacant are prioritized on basically three levels.
High priorities, being health and safety related.
So, generally they are just trying to remember all the different categories.
The medical professionals, doctors and nurses, your technicians, physiotherapists and also number of corrections positions because they affect the safety of the public are considered to be high priority.
The second category is for the operational. That involves your program delivery a lot of your front line personnel and the third category is the administrative positions.
So, when it comes to allocating scarce resources at the community, obviously they are going to look at for the allocated to the highest priority positions like the health related, teachers, safety related, etc.
Thank you, Mr. Scott.
Are there any situations or cases where people would not be eligible to apply for staff housing.
I am aware that in Cambridge Bay for example, there are 15 or 20 people who are working for the Government of Nunavut and they would like staff housing because they can’t get into social or public housing and they can’t go to a bank to get a mortgage.
Maybe they are on the list somewhere but they are not a priority; they are deemed ineligible, or a lower priority to receive housing, but there must be absolute cases where people can’t qualify for Government of Nunavut staff housing?
Full time; indeterminate employees of the Government of Nunavut are eligible or can apply for staff housing so that does eliminate casual hires from applying or being eligible for staff housing.
Anybody who has owned developed property within the community within the last two years is not eligible for staff housing as well, so that if you can’t sell your house and apply for staff housing in the same community.
So there are a few exceptions where Government of Nunavut employees are not eligible.
It depends of what classification of employee they are, whether the casual or full time, term, or indeterminate, or if they have owned homes in the past.
If the Government of Nunavut staff employee applied for housing and was denied, there is an appeal process mechanism.
Could you take us through that?
Mr. Scott: There is an Appeals Committee that is chaired, it is called by the President of the Housing Corporation and chaired by the Corporation.
On that Committee, if I remember correctly, is a representative of the Deputy Minister for the department of the employee that is appealing as well as the Deputy Minister for Human Resources, and I believe the Deputy Minister of Justice, as well is on that Committee.
Are there any situations where the final decisions of an Appeal Committee would be overturned and ruled invalid?
There is always the possibility where the decision by the Allocation Appeals Committee can be overturned.
That would normally be by somebody, such as the Rentals Officer, or by the courts.
We are dealing with the O&M budget.
Just to finalize my question on this point.
We have District Allocation Committees, who allocate housing by priority.
All Government of Nunavut employees are eligible, except casuals.
If they don’t get housing; they can appeal.
The Appeal Committee can uphold the appeal or deny it, but then someone could come along after the Appeal Committee makes their final decision, and then they can still get housing?
That is what I am confused about.
Who has the final say?
Does the Rental Officer have the final say in whether Government of Nunavut housing is allocated?
Mr. Scott: You can go on farther than that.
We actually have the option then to appeal. The Rental Officer’s decision and go to the Territorial Court System to overrule the Rental Officer; and on and on.
The process can be cumbersome, in some cases, not necessary.
I thought that might be my final question.
So, the appeal process would work to the advantage of an individual who has the time and resources, who are really desperate and wants housing. An ordinary staff person, who doesn’t have the resources would be kind of out of luck.
So whoever has got money to hire a lawyer to pursue an appeal or a rental and take it to the court could possibly get housing even if they are not eligible.
Mr. Scott: The only time the lawyers would get involved would be the court level and I wouldn’t trust if it wouldn’t get far where we would have to engage lawyers and require an employee to hire a lawyer to state their case.
Up until the rental officer stage, generally there is no lawyers involved.
I wanted to just touch on Affordable Housing Program.
In particular a couple of communities my riding, Bathurst Inlet and Umingmaktuk.
I raised this with the minister last year and his staff that the good folks down in those communities appreciate the help you provided to them last year.
They asked me to ask you if you are going to assist them again this year because their houses still needed a bit more renovations, they need doors, stoves, and windows.
So if you could update me on those please.
We’re on L-6.
Affordable Housing Program is on L-6.
Affordable Housing Program is in L-10.
We’re dealing with L-6.
In regards to housing allocations, I would like to talk about that briefly and I talked about it last year.
It seems like when there is a huge change, if they get a house this year and then they get another one.
(interpretation): The minister and his team will remember that I noted I in the fall that I was amazed that they had adopted a new policy of allocating houses where there are greatest overcrowding in the communities.
It probably makes sense in a nutshell, if you just look at overcrowding therefore that says their greatest needs to that particular community.
Looking at the chart there, unless you have close to 30 percent of the community overcrowding or 40 all the other communities that by choice have chosen not to have a large family are penalized.
Therefore how long had that policy been in place and how long is going to go on?
Maybe I’ll get my colleague to clarify which policy this is that he’s talking about.
The allocations have been based on needs in the communities.
Mr. Curley: I’d like to get an answer for my question because I think it is quite simply clear that unless you have a 30 percent or a 40 percent of the community that have the highest overcrowding, the other communities during this conception housing allocation, are ignored.
So, my question is to the officials. In the Housing Corporation is, I’m sure that they made that recommendation.
I have never ever seen, really, community getting more than 50 or 10 housing in one constructive season.
That policy was changed since when?
I believe it was this coming year and how long was that policy.
Is that going to be carried out now?
I’m not sure if, which of the officials that he is directing that question to.
He will get an answer from one of my witnesses.
Mr. Curley: It doesn’t matter which official answers that question.
Hon. Peter Kilabuk: I’ll ask my President to take that question, thank you.
Mr. Scott
I lost my earpiece half way through the last part of the question, but I believe, if I understand the question from Mr. Curley correctly, the premise of allocating houses in the social housing field has always been, since the beginning, the creation of Canada Mortgage and Housing I believe in the 1950’s, has been delivery based on the greatest need.
There’s several different criteria that can be developed to determine what is the greatest need, and overcrowding is certainly a high factor when it comes to establishing greatest need.
The whole premise behind social housing is need.
For as long as I’ve been involved in housing, new construction was based on need, what was the greatest need.
There were needs studies done periodically in all communities over the years across the north, and recommendations based on the greatest need and options are presented to Cabinet and Financial Management Board every year or just about every year.
For a two year period, the Financial Management Board did decide, instead of identifying or delivering to the communities with the greatest need, they decided to deliver some to everybody and that was the decision that was made collectively by the Cabinet or Financial Management Board at the time.
For this year’s allocation, again a series of options were provided to the Financial Management Board and it was felt then that giving a little bit to everybody wasn’t having a substantial impact.
To have the greatest impact on the overcrowding, we should be focusing the resources on where the greatest need and where the highest overcrowding exists.
I believe that, that was the basis of the decision and I can’t predict what the state of decision will be in future years.
I’m sorry, I think we’re a little bit confused.
After I took over the chairmanship, I’m trying to follow the L-6, L-7, L-8, up to 10.
Do you want to go page by page?
They’re mostly all informational items.
After the questions are finished, we’ll get to page L-4.
I think that was the confusion in the House.
The chairman should have explained exactly how this process works.
We’re not going by clause-by-clause or page-by-page or dollar amount approvals, so it should be pretty flexible as far as I’m concerned.
You give some of the other members quite some flexibility and I’m just following up on the same page, I get that page from my colleague and said Cambridge Bay is closest to the national average, therefore, they don’t need any housing.
They have the lowest.
So, he picked it up here today for ten minutes.
I would like to be accorded the same privilege.
Yes, they agree.
The reason I’m asking, further to my question in the fall, that there did not appear to be any reward or incentive for communities, either to manage the properties, and also have the best possible relationship with the tenant and collect rental payments from the communities.
Actually, to have a sound management is not part of award for allocating houses.
The only incentive the housing corporation has now adopted is, if you have the biggest production for children in your community, you’re going to be granted and with this policy now that you have, you did not tell me how long is that going to apply.
If that’s the way we’re going to see the housing being allocated in Nunavut, simply on the greatest overcrowding factors, based on some methodology that does not appear to be proven.
Some communities that are in the 10-15% overcrowding range will never really qualify.
Is that the way I now understand?
I know there are at least two communities that are getting 15 units this coming summer, and I believe maybe three.
So I’m asking the Minister and his officials to explain how long will this policy be carried over for the future.
I thank my colleague because I think it’s important that we have a good understanding on both sides.
It is our duty to give the information in full.
So, to try to give you a better understanding on why we took this approach this year, usually the factors as discussed earlier.
Looking at the strategic infrastructure money that was available and it being the second year, this was, in my view, an opportune time to take an intensified approach, to try and lower the severe housing shortages in those communities that have been identified as having the highest needs at the time.
This is not to say that the other communities do not qualify.
We know there are housing needs in every community.
Like I said, we know there’s a need for three thousand additional units to date.
It has been no intention of mine to relay the message to any of my colleagues that, because they rank lowest, they do not have a need.
They do have needs.
I will end my comments by saying that I’m going to be very open to any suggestions that my colleague and other colleagues around the House may have for us to review the capital allocation process for the coming year.
Mr. Curley: Thank you. I’d like to ask the housing corporation officials as well, how long ago did that kind of policy that provided more than ten houses to each community begin, and how long is it going to be carried out?
Previously in other years, there’s always a couple of duplexes or what not, and one duplex and that kind of stuff.
This policy that you adopted this fall, because it was not applied in the first Assembly, is this injunction a temporary one, is it going to be a trend for the next few years?
If we applied now, some communities would not be eligible as far as I’m concerned up to at least ten years.
If we apply this principle based on overcrowding only, some communities that average between 15 percent of the overcrowding in their community will not be eligible within ten to 15 years.
My question is, how long will that be a policy, this practice be carried on.
Mr. Scott: Okay our role is to make recommendations and various options for delivery of allocations to the communities.
And that’s what we do.
There’s a variety of options that could be chosen from, and the actual decision on that is made by the Financial Management Board. I can not predict what options they’re going to pick on next years delivery.
Next year we have no federal funding for 2006/07 at this point to assist us in getting a larger delivery so its circumstances will determine what will be decided in the future years.
Mr. Chairman: Thank you Mr. Scott.
So my understanding is the practice that was applied this year for allocating houses to two or three communities that were given at least fifteen units each will probably not be practiced next year.
Is that what I understood from the President?
Mr. Chairman: (interpretation): Thank you Mr. Curley.
Mr. Scott: I can’t predict what the decision will be.
Say this fall when it comes down to allocating public housing units.
We will follow the same process that has been followed for a number of years and develop a series of options based on the resources that are available to us and the decision will be made subsequently.
Mr. Chairman (interpretation): Thank you Mr. Scott.
Mr. Curley: So the President does not have a plan.
It will be based on political climate.
It will be based on federal factors, whether or not there is more infusion of housing needs capital from the federal government.
Given the fact that there might be an average case scenario that there will be enough resources, will you be recommending the same criteria for allocating houses that you did for this fiscal year?
To make it clearer, I work with my staff, when were making proposals for Cabinet approval, and if I’m presenting something to the Cabinet, I would give it to the Cabinet and then it would be up to them to approve it.
We have been making more than one recommendation and that’s the procedure I usually take.
Indicating our best option and also show other options that we can use, so we will use that same route, Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Mr. Chairman: (interpretation): Thank you, Minister.
Mr. Curley: Yes my question actually was for the President of the Housing Corporation, given the fact that he does make the recommendations.
Will he make the same recommendations for allocation of houses as he did with this current fiscal year?
Given the fact that maybe given the average resources including the capital and federal spending and what not.
Not the best case scenario, but the average one, if you have that, will you be recommending, as you said you have a three or four multi-year plan, will that be one of the recommendations that you put the money where the 30 percent or 40 percent range of overcrowding in communities are?
Mr. Chairman: Mr. Scott
My recommendation to the minister on allocating will always be based on greatest need.
The largest single factor that establishes the greatest need generally is overcrowding, and that will continue to be my recommendation to the minister, because I don’t see the point of delivering houses where people don’t need houses.
I’m not saying that every community in Nunavut there isn’t a need for housing.
But we have to identify where the greatest need is and that’s where we should be delivering as many of our housing resources as possible.
I appreciate the frankness of the member, I mean the President of the Housing Corporation.
I’m not convinced when people, the families chose to have three or four kids and not have an overcrowding and still not have housing
There’s no overcrowding, but they are out there, kids with single families and kids with three or four kids.
Not overcrowded families, a whole slew of them.
They’re not the priority of the Housing Corporation.
Is that what I understood from the President of the Housing Corporation?
Mr. Chairman (interpretation): Thank you Mr. Curley.
Mr. Scott: Thank you Mr. Chairman.
I guess what I’m trying to say is our focus is wherever the greatest need for housing is.
Whether it’s, regardless of whether it’s a family of two kids, three kids, ten kids in the household.
Wherever the community that has the highest need, the greatest overcrowding, that’s where we should be focusing our resources.
That’s my recommendation to my minister, who then takes it to Cabinet and Financial Management Board.
If that were the case then maybe you can also review your staff housing policy.
That it be adhered to.
The community applicants, the community members that do apply for the government positions instead of hiring from South that it be linked to local, that they be provided with housing as well because that’s where the greatest need for these positions and jobs be created locally.
Is that at all one of the factors that allocate staff housing through the Housing Corporation?
Mr. Scott: Thank you.
When deciding on where to apply, where we need additional staff housing units is generally based upon the number of vacant government positions.
That’s the premise.
If there are five vacancies in Taloyoak and five vacant positions and we’ve got no housing, then they need five houses.
That is what is identified.
It has nothing to do with local hires or outside hires.
However, on the priority, when there is a shortage of units in a community then the highest priority will generally get the units allocated first, such as health professionals, teachers, it’s either that or those services can not be provided to the residents of the community.
If those positions can’t be filled because we can’t allocate a staff housing unit to them. It also applies to Correction Officers and other.
Fire protection related positions, etc.
They do get the higher priority.
If there’s extra surplus staff housing units, then of course they look at operational positions and then administration positions.
Mr. Curley: My last comment is that the Housing Corporation reviews the Housing Allocation Policy.
I think it should be based on some incentive; it should also be based on the sizes of families.
There are single parents out there. There are single families; there are small families who desperately have to be considered.
The Housing Corporation and government does not have a single family policy.
They are in an immediate need; people who are transferring to communities that need jobs.
I’m not suggesting that they should be at the same priority, but there should be within the consideration.
If we can apply government housing to southerners who have one or two kids coming in, we should be able to do that with our own residents in Nunavut.
There are many hundreds of young family that have no kids, that are looking for housing.
I can tell you they’re not part of this overcrowding factor; they desperately are in need, so the single window policy, they nearly are on the greatest need being interpreted as overcrowding is not acceptable.
I support housing all over, but I think we need to consider that we need to mix it up so that we are not disfranchising those people who have chosen not to have overcrowding kids and therefore not eligible for housing forever.
I will have more questions on Page L-9 and put me on top of the list.
Mr. Chairman: Thank you Mr. Curley. (interpretation): I think that was just a comment.
We’ll take a short 30 minute break.
We’ll take a supper break.
>>Committee recessed at 18:16 and resumed at 18:53
Mr. Chairman: Thank you, we’re back again.
Mr. Curley had just finished asking questions.
I would like to ask about, in your business plan on page L-17. I cannot truly believe, where it states that monthly rent is expensive.
In looking at the figure 8, public housing costs, water and sanitation, it’s very expensive.
Why is it so costly?
What is causing it to be 1/3 of the figure?
From the total, why is it so high?
In regards to his question, those were monthly public costs from 2003 for water and sanitation, approximately in the area of 29%.
The subsidies that are provided to the uses of water and sanitation, and then it goes the municipalities and have to be given some funding, so I am not too sure I have heard public housing are not subsidized.
Maybe that is why there is a high cost in there.