Thank you, Mr. Chairman. It's been a long day. I'm getting ahead of myself a little bit. On page 14, the $75,000 that's going to be provided for costs associated with a short-term lease renewal at the Lahm Ridge Tower. I'm just wondering if the Minister can explain at all why the base rental rate is going from $181.91 a square metre to $226.13 a square metre. Doesn't the Department of Public Works and Services know when leases are coming up and coming due, and isn't there any proactive type of activity that takes place in that department that they would know when a lease like this was coming up and try to get a rate and go forward from there, or put it out to tender or something? Why is this $75,000 here today, Mr. Chairman, when the department should be proactive in trying to identify leases and take care of issues like this so that we don't get short-term lease renewals like this in front of us? Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

Thank you, Mr. Ramsay. Mr. Roland.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I guess all I can say to that is because of all the proactive work of Members, Members have stated how they want the opportunity for businesses to bid on the work that's happening. In this particular case, the lease was due to expire, and a number of months ago I had presented the option to potentially do a renewal of this because, again, when you look at the base rental rate to the newer rate, there's a substantial increase; and that was one of the considerations we were looking at on the fiscal side of the equation, was to see if we, in fact, could remain close to what we were paying at the old lease rate. I brought that forward as information to my colleagues. I was told that we needed to do a request for proposal on this space. That then kicked into this process where we needed to then do a short-term lease renewal until we could have an RFP ready to go. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Roland. Mr. Ramsay.

Thank you, Madam Chair. I'm just wondering how much $226.13 a square metre is over market rate? Thank you, Madam Chair.

Thank you, Mr. Ramsay. Mr. Roland.

Thank you, Madam Chair. Madam Chair, that is not over market rate. That is going out there and renewal of the space based on existing rates and stats we have available for rates around the city. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Roland. Mr. Ramsay.

Well, I don't know, that's a debatable fact whether or not that's below market, Madam Chair. I won't debate that at this time, but I'm just wondering, when can we expect something to happen with this lease. Is it something the department's going to lock into, another 10-year arrangement like the last lease they had on this building? What can we expect? Thank you, Madam Chair.

Thank you, Mr. Ramsay. Mr. Roland.

Thank you, Madam Chair. Madam Chair, as I stated, we're going out for an RFP on this space. This will be a short-term lease until we can come up with the scenarios. There are two departments within that facility: the Department of Education, Culture and Employment and the Department of Transportation. We're working with both departments to see what their requirements are for the space, and we would then go out and seek. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Roland. Department of Public Works and Services, operations expenditures, not previously authorized, total department, $916,000. Mr. Villeneuve.

Thank you, Madam Chair. I have a quick question on the planning and project management staff for the Samuel Hearne Secondary School. With regard to the added workload associated with re-profiling these projects, these are two more capital projects in that region, and now we're talking about the inability of the current staff to manage them. I'm assuming there are project officers there already, but what about their inability to manage these two extra projects? Maybe if the Minister could just provide me with some rationale that he must have gotten from the regional staff as to why two more capital projects on the books makes it unmanageable. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Villeneuve. Mr. Roland.

Thank you, Madam Chair. Madam Chair, as you will see and as has been done in the past with a number of the larger projects undertaken by this government, those would require almost a full-time staff member to deal with all the areas of the work that's required in preparing those facilities, from planning to construction, and then to final turnover to the departments. In these cases, we're looking for one project

officer, and that's identified as about $124,000 annually from mid-November of this year through to March 2013; and, as well, a facility planner from November 2005 through to October 2006, somewhere in that area. Again, it's to deal with the fact that over the years, as you heard the Minister of Municipal and Community Affairs deal with his department, when departments have undertaken reductions in the past, that has hampered the ability to take on some of the larger projects that we have ongoing. As the Member is aware, we've stepped up our capital program for this fiscal year prior to previous fiscal years due to the fact that, as has been stated on a number of occasions, when the bigger reductions were made in prior assemblies, a lot of the hit was taken on capital programs. The staff in those areas were also removed when reductions were made. Now that we're ramping back up on the capital side to deal with the backlog of capital programs or the serious state we find our facilities in, we're having to ramp that up. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Roland. Mr. Villeneuve.

Thank you, Madam Chair. Just a quick follow-up. I'm just wondering, I know there are some regions, for instance the Inuvik region, that are experiencing a lot of growth, and there's a lot of activity and capital projects that are being worked on and developed. But there are other areas, like the South Slave region for instance, where there is limited growth and very few capital projects in the works. If the department has actually looked from within to say that maybe they should move some project officers out of the slower regions and into the regions that are experiencing bustling economies and a lot of capital projects coming through this government to accommodate the growth, has that even been considered before we start hiring new staff and facility planners and getting new money for it? Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Villeneuve. Mr. Roland.

Thank you, Madam Chair. One of the things we've done with Public Works and Services is, to meet our targets of reduction scenarios, we initially started out in this term of the 15th Assembly to deal with our reductions through attrition where, when we had people leaving or retiring, we would not fill those positions. So through that time period, we've also let go individuals across the board, whether it's in the South Slave or in headquarters or in the northern part of the territory. What you find in Inuvik with these two projects is that these projects are replacing existing facilities. They're not new facilities. In fact, their time line or life line has been exceeded, and these projects have been on the books, but because of our fiscal situation, have continually been bumped back to the point where we find ourselves now in Inuvik of having to do emergency repairs to keep one of the facilities operational. That's why you see this coming forward as it is. Later on in this supplementary appropriation, you'll see some changes to the capital plan, as well, to try and address this situation. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Roland. Mr. Villeneuve.

Thank you, Madam Chair. Just one quick point, I guess. As the Minister stated, these aren't new capital projects, so why do we need more staff to manage them?

Thank you, Mr. Villeneuve. Mr. Roland.

Thank you, Madam Chair. My point being that these are facilities on the ground. They are almost 40 years old, and their lifetime has been surpassed in the sense we are on borrowed time with these facilities, as well as with a number of other facilities. That's why, as a government, we've decided to proceed with a number of schools in the Sahtu as well as in the Mackenzie Delta to try and catch up with our aging facilities. So when it comes to actual planning and construction, again, we have staff that are on the ground dealing with the normal workload that's there, but when you throw on these large capital projects, we don't have the resources to deal with them in an adequate time frame. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Roland. Mr. Yakeleya.