Thank you, Madam Chair. Madam Chair, I'm kind of asking these questions in a specific way because we're still taking applications from the fiscal year 2004-05 and the money has been spent. What we have are people who go to the bank who would qualify, who live in our housing units, who are our prime group that we're trying to focus this on, where we've got families who are in our low-cost housing. I don't know what they pay. Some of them pay $32 a month; some of them probably pay $200 or $300 a month. But I'm talking specifically about people who have gone to the bank, applied for potential mortgages, worked with the Housing Corporation and EDAP, we've taken their application and accepted their application on the approval process, but there's no money to move forward. These clients have gone through moving forward to try to get home access. It's not a question of do they have a job, it's not a question of bank approval, it's not a question of if they meet the requirements of the Housing Corporation. These are not the questions here at all. It is what do we do when we don't have any money and we're still processing these applications? The challenge is what happens to them? Do they have to wait three or four more months until we pass the next budget, which is now into April, when we've got people who could have been approved in November, December, maybe even January, but we had no money for them because it was used up, and rightfully so. It's going to the program that I think is very key to the success of getting people out of social housing and giving them the leg up.
My concern specifically is when we don't have any money for them, we're still approving their applications. Are we not putting them in a category by themselves where they're considered priorities as of April 1st assuming none of their circumstances have changed, their application hasn't been changed? Do we not consider them any type of priority whatsoever? I guess the ultimate question is, as soon as the policy to fund these folks is out of money, why don't we just stamp their application with "we're out of money, come back April 1st"?
We're still having people applying through the banks with the hope and dream of homeownership. There are a lot of dreams put on hold because the right people are missing out on their opportunities here and I wouldn't want to be building up a false sense of hope that this program exists. Like anything, there's only a certain amount of money to go around, but what are we doing for these folks that we're still taking and scrutinizing their applications and putting them through the credit checks? It's not a question of a job, it's not a question of whether they qualify under the Housing Corporation, it's not a question about whether they have bad credit or won't get someone to help sign their loan, it's not a question of that. It's a question of the down payment this EDAP promises, but we're taking their application, scrutinizing them and approving them without any money. They fall into this little mystery zone.
Why don't we get it today that either we should be, as of today, refusing their applications, sending them back with a note to say to reapply when we have money after April 1st, or are we taking the position that they are now a priority for April 1st and when we get money we'll phone you and we're going to re-screen you to ensure you still qualify and then assuming nothing's changed from when you originally applied and we didn't have any money, we'll proceed and process your application? Madam Chair, I'm really concerned that we're building up false hope for people who are in need. Thank you, Madam Chair.