I have to agree with the Minister that they do have some very challenging tasks before them to try and alleviate some of the pressures that we have in our housing crisis in the NWT. I don't want to talk about a lot of the things that a lot of the other Members have already raised with respect to housing. I'm sure that in every community in the NWT we all have basically the same concerns and issues with housing, and options that probably could be the same options of how we are going to fix the problem. Probably everybody is along the same lines that just the delivery of the housing program is one of the big barriers to the programs at being effective and in alleviating the housing crisis.

With that, I have spoken with the Minister on prior occasions with respect to the delivery of the programs and the people that are delivering them at the regional level and at the LHO level. I'm sure the Minister is aware that a lot of the feedback he gets from clients in the communities, be it social housing clients or homeownership clients, is the lack of two-way communication between the department officials and the clients that they're there to serve. A lot of that communication just doesn't happen. Although a lot of the times the Minister gets the word that, yes, they are working on it or they are consulting with community

members about this or individuals with respect to their housing needs, but in a lot of cases that never happens and it never goes any further than that. A quick phone call or a visit, people would appreciate, even from the regional levels. That I have brought up with the Minister before and I'm sure we can work something out in the future to help avoid those kinds of simple problems that could be solved really easily.

More specifically, I would like to get on to some of the stuff like the maintenance management operating system. The Housing Corporation probably puts millions and millions of dollars into developing this program to make maintenance management of all the LHOs and the Housing Corporation a little more efficient and effective. When that program was implemented about five years ago, I was still employed with the local housing authority and we took this program and started using it and there were a couple or three years there that the program was just totally useless. I guess there's no better word for it. When the LHO managers get together every year to discuss LHO problems, funding arrangements and the like, with the Housing staff, there's always concerns there with the maintenance management system and how it isn't working and there are too many glitches in the system. Who even thought of that in the first place? Because there are many programs out there that have been developed by experts like Microsoft and whatnot that could have been just as easily incorporated into this inventory management system that the government reinvented.

When the LHOs get together, the managers get together every year and they kind of give the Housing Corporation a list of recommendations on changes that they could do to better deliver social housing programs or just basic EDAP programs and repair programs. A lot of those recommendations never get followed up or acknowledged. They just go and probably once they get into the office, they are just put on a shelf or put in the shredder and then the managers come back again a year later with the same concerns, the same public outcry about why these programs aren't working for them. Again, it seems to be like a really bad cycle of lack of communication or response to what the LHOs are telling them. They are the people that are dealing directly with all these housing programs and the clients that they are out there to deliver them to. I think that any recommendations that come from those people should be heeded and maybe incorporated into some of the programs that the Housing Corporation wants to change or customize to individual community needs. I think that's something that is very important for the Housing Corporation to understand. These people are on the front lines and they're the ones who are allocated a certain amount of dollars, which usually is not a whole lot. They deliver to the best of their ability and when they come back with good plans, they're usually just gone unabated.

With that, just as far as the market housing initiative goes, I think it was a good idea that they are trying to establish some kind of market in these communities. But I have to tell the Minister, that could have a real negative effect with new homeowners. If you're creating your own market, which might be a little over inflated if you start getting appraisers in there and doing market value not really based on development costs per se, but more on a market that isn't even there and you start saying these mortgages are worth $160,000 for a housing unit which is probably not worth any more than $100,000. So I think this whole market housing initiative the department has to be really careful with when they're trying to establish a free market when it isn't actually a free market, it's more or less a market driven by government. I don't think that lends itself as far as helping people buy their own homes. I think just to have an negative impact on that part.

I know the federal government funding for the public housing in Canada in general is going to be sunsetted, I think they said in 2032 and that's why they're taking this new market rent initiative and reinstating it because the LHOs have to find better ways of making people pay rent. I don't think that this big rent adjustment or this new phasing in of the new rent scale is going to help anybody. I think the corporation has to take a more individual approach to helping their clients. They have to treat everybody independently and individually. We don't have a whole lot of people here. We're only talking maybe 5,000 clients or so in the homeownership program and not many more into public housing. I think the government and the Housing Corporation should treat everybody individually, based on their circumstances, their income, their history and their aspirations and the like. It just doesn't happen, it seems, and people get kind of frustrated with that.

But you know, that's just one of the obstacles that the Housing Corporation has to tackle in the future and I look forward to seeing some improvement. Just a quick question, I guess, with the EDAP that's being delivered here in Yellowknife and the eligibility requirements for that. I just want to ask the Minister what is the income threshold requirement for a resident in Yellowknife to get the EDAP eligibility?