Thank you, Mr. Yakeleya. At this time, I will ask the Minister responsible for the Housing Corporation if he would like to bring witnesses into the Chamber. Mr. Handley.

Yes, Madam Chair.

Thank you, does the committee agree?

Thank you. I will ask the Sergeant-at-Arms if he would, please, escort the witnesses to the witness table.

Mr. Handley, could you please introduce your witnesses for the record?

Thank you, Madam Chair. With me are Jeff Polakoff, president of the Housing Corporation; Jeff Anderson, the chief financial officer for the corporation.

Okay. Thank you, Mr. Handley. General comments. First on my list I have Mr. Ramsay.

Thank you, Madam Chair. I would like to welcome the Minister and his staff here to the proceedings this afternoon. In the Minister's opening remarks for the Housing Corporation, he talked of some money being spent on constructing 168 dwellings in communities across the Northwest Territories in 2007-2008. The figure of $119 million would be spent on housing and a total of $32 million will be spent to construct 168 dwellings. The question I have, Madam Chair, is last year when the affordable housing strategy was rolled out, to my knowledge it was 300 units. If the Minister could perhaps make those numbers right, it was 300 last year and if this is 168 now, did we not get some funding that we were supposed to get or when will the other 132 dwellings be constructed?

Thank you, Mr. Ramsay. Mr. Handley.

Thank you, Madam Chair. Last year, in 2006-2007, the number was 185. This year, the number is 168. Then in total, the three-year amount for these houses will be 530 units. That's an estimate that can vary depending on cost of construction and the kind of units we build over the three years. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Handley. Mr. Ramsay.

Thank you, Madam Chair. Of the 185 units last year, how many of those were actually constructed and in use today?

Thank you, Mr. Ramsay. Mr. Handley.

Thank you, Madam Chair. Roughly 100 of the units are completed and occupied or ready to be occupied. Madam Chair, remember that we already started late in 2006-07, so we didn't get as much as we would have liked to have done. But the balance of the units are pretty much scheduled to be completed by late this summer/early fall. It's our view that this will not impact on the 2007-08 allocation.

Thank you, Mr. Handley. Mr. Ramsay.

Thank you, Madam Chair. I have got a couple of other comments that I wanted to make on the Housing Corporation. I see that there is a 17-position growth in the corporation and I guess most of that centres around the land and the acquisition of land in the various communities to put the housing. What I am wondering, and I have to applaud the Housing Corporation for the streamlining of the programs and the program delivery down to the four main programs that the Minister made in his statement today on outlining those four new programs. Given the fact that you are looking at the streamlining down to four programs, there is no correlation there in terms of position reduction. In fact, we are looking at a 17-person hike in positions just to address the affordable housing strategy.

The other question I have, Madam Chair, is I would like to know if the Housing Corporation ever entertained the notion of going out to the private marketplace to contract some of these services that would see the provision of land and the availability of land in the communities addressed by a private function instead of looking at hiring civil servants to carry out some of this work. Some of this work might be contracted out by some of the same individuals we hire to do the work. So I would like to ask the Minister that question. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Ramsay. Mr. Handley.

Madam Chair, of the 16 positions that we increased, those are lands people and also technical people. In terms of the land, this issue is one that we are working with MACA on. It's a critical one. If we

don't have land, we don't have houses. While it might be possible to get some people from the private sector, I don't think there is that kind of expertise out in the private sector to be able to do that for us at the same kind of price we can do it ourselves.

On the technical side, again as we have heard other Members mention, we are often frustrated because the private sector is so busy in some regions, it's very difficult to find people who can take this on and do it on a timely basis. So some Members are asking us to take more staff or do more training.

Then the final point is these positions are tied very much to the affordable housing initiative, so they are not indeterminate positions. As we flow through this, our intention is once the land issues are dealt with and we no longer need people, then the positions would disappear. Regarding the technical positions, my own feeling is that we need to have the technical staff and we will continue to need more technical people out in the region at least until our economy slows down to the point that the private sector can once again handle this for us. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Handley. Mr. Ramsay.

Thank you, Madam Chair. An issue I have had that goes back a couple of years with the movement of $30 million to ECE in terms of the social housing policy side of things, there wasn't a corresponding reduction of positions in the Housing Corporation. In turn, we went and hired 13 or 14 new positions in ECE to carry out the social policy work at ECE. There was never a corresponding reduction at the Housing Corporation. Again, the Minister didn't really answer my question with regard to the streamlining of programs. Are you going to need the same level of staff to carry out the four programs today that you had to carry out the multitude of programs you had previously? I think that's a legitimate question and I would like to ask the Minister that. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Ramsay. Mr. Handley.

Thank you, Madam Chair. The piece that ECE took over is with the rental assessments, assessing people's eligibility and the amount of rent they are entitled to. On that side, we lost five positions. The LHOs still have to do the management of the public housing stock and so on. So they continue with the same responsibilities except for those assessments.

So, Madam Chair, we lost five positions, we've added 16 positions in but we are delivering a bigger program, a much more aggressive program now with affordable housing than we did before. We still have to maintain the federal programs as well, by the way. So that means we continue with the same responsibilities there. So even though we rolled this into four programs, rolling it into four programs doesn't necessarily reduce the amount of work our people have. In fact, it may increase it. What it does is it makes it more understandable for the clients out there, so they know that if they need repairs to a unit there's one program that deals with repairs. That's where they go and our people help them to fit their unique situation. It doesn't save us money. It doesn't save us time, but it certainly makes the programs more easily understood by the clients. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Handley. Mr. Ramsay.

Thank you, Madam Chair. I thank the Minister for his response. The good news in all of this, I guess, is the streamlining in the programming, especially the sliding scale. I think that, to folks, to people out there who want to access that program, with a sliding scale in place I think it makes it much more accessible and the drop-offs aren't there like they were before. With that, Madam Chair, I'd like to thank, again, the Minister.

I am encouraged with the changes that I'm seeing at the Housing Corporation, aside from the position growth. I've been quite consistent with that since I got here three and a half years ago. Government just grows and I think we always have to try to do the best we can without just going out and adding positions. I think there's a function here or a role for the Department of Municipal and Community Affairs to play in the rollout of land availability in the communities. Nobody knows the communities in the Northwest Territories better than that of MACA and their staff and I think every effort should be taken to utilize the staff at MACA, the expertise they have in the communities, and not try to duplicate any efforts that are going to be obvious. That's where I'd like to leave that off, Madam Chair. Thank you.