Thank you, Ms. Bisaro. Minister McLeod.

Thank you. It was a decentralization initiative. I think we’ve taken $100,000 to establish a two-year term position of master trainer that’s going to be located in Hay River. Thank you.

So, where does that money show up then? Is it staying within MACA or where is it? Thanks.

The money was re-profiled. It is staying within MACA. Thank you.

Where is it within MACA? Thank you.

It’s in compensation and benefits within the School of Community Government.

Now, I’m really confused. So, we’ve gone down $100,000 and you said it’s for a position that’s within the School of Community Government and I thought that what we were looking at was the School of Community Government. So, I’m lost. Or has it gone from contributions to compensation? Is that what you’re trying to tell me? Thank you. The light just went on. Thanks.

The Member is absolutely correct; it went from a contribution, less $100,000 to A Brilliant North, to compensation and benefits to your master trainer within the School of

Community Government. So it went from contribution to compensation. Thank you.

Thank you, Minister McLeod. Committee, we’re on page 380, School of Community Government, grants, contributions and transfers, total contributions, $580,000. Does committee agree?

Thank you, committee. Committee, page 381, School of Community Government, active positions, information item. Any questions?

Committee, page 383, sport, recreation and youth, operations expenditure summary, $6.792 million. Does committee agree? Ms. Bisaro.

Thanks, Mr. Chair. I have some questions here on 383, but it also applies to 384 so I hope I can refer to both of these pages.

Two issues specifically. The first one has to do with the Arctic Winter Games 2018 Host Society contribution. I’m not against the contribution, but I am really trying, and having great difficulty, in understanding why the money is being given out so early. This is 2015 and even if it goes in 2016 that’s two years in advance of the actual operations of the Games itself and it’s not my recollection for previous Games. So, can I get an explanation, please? Thank you.

Thank you, Ms. Bisaro. For that we’ll go to Deputy Minister Williams.

Thank you, Mr. Williams. Ms. Bisaro.

Thanks, Mr. Chair. Thanks to the deputy minister for the explanation.

My other question here, I have two other questions actually. The second one is the amount for volunteer recognition which is $30,000. This is a large change from the last year when there was money, which was ’13-14 when it was $3,000. Nothing in ’14-15 and then $30,000 in ’15-16. If I read the description it tells me that this is to promote and encourage community volunteers and through planned community recognition events.

I guess I’m struggling with the rationale that giving money to a community for a volunteer recognition event is going to increase volunteerism, so I guess I would like to know from the Minister of the department on what did they base this decision to put $30,000 into recognition events. What rationale, what evaluation of something else proved that this was a good thing to do?

Thank you, Ms. Bisaro. Minister McLeod.

Thank you, Mr. Chair. This is to provide communities with $1,000 to recognize the volunteers they have in the communities, have some kind of an event for them, and that, in turn, may encourage other people to volunteer. I think this is something that is long overdue. You get a small community that can access this money and honour the volunteers in the community and that might encourage other people to volunteer. So, I think there are some other benefits to this other than just giving the community $1,000. I think it will help. I believe it will help build volunteer capacity, especially in the smaller communities where they may be challenged sometime with volunteers. I think it’s a very good initiative and I think it’s going to go towards our goal of having more volunteers, hopefully, come on stream. Thank you.

I appreciate that that’s the rationale and all well and good. This is the first year for this program, so is there going to be any kind of analysis after ’15-16 to determine whether or not – not that whether or not the money was spent, I’m sure it’ll be spent – it’s doing what it’s intended to do? Is volunteerism increasing? Because my gut feeling is that we are losing volunteers throughout the territory and I think we’ve been losing volunteers since the federal money for the Volunteer NWT disappeared. I don’t think we’ve had the same level of volunteerism since that federal money disappeared and the GNWT decided not to replace it.

So, bottom line, will there be any kind of evaluation of whether or not this money has increased the number of volunteers and overall volunteer activity in our communities? Thank you.

Yes, our plan is to do an evaluation of this and which communities had taken us up on it and whether it’s increased the number of volunteers. Especially in the smaller communities, your core volunteer group is basically the same and there are some new people that come on. Having the opportunity to be in a number of these small communities and seeing what their volunteer core group is like, you see it during events that go on in the community. The fact that we have earmarked a few dollars to help recognize some of the contributions of these people I think will go a long way to increasing volunteers in small communities. The Member is right; it has been a bit of a challenge, but I believe this type of, I’m not sure you can call it an incentive, volunteers are the last people in the world who want to be recognized, but we feel this is a small service that we can help honour volunteers. Thank you.

My last question here has to do with the proposed move of the NGO Stabilization Fund from the Executive to MACA. I have to say strongly again that this is a bad move. I think this particular fund reaches across many departments, as does the Department of Executive. Not that I have any qualms about the ability of MACA to handle this, but I just don’t think that the focus in MACA is as broad as it needs to be. The NGOs that access this fund provide very basic services on behalf of the GNWT, emergency shelters, housing, it’s quite varied and it’s not the focus that MACA has. I know the Premier has said that it’s being moved because MACA is where we have placed our volunteers and that is where we place our volunteers, but these NGOs are not strictly volunteer organizations. Several of them are businesses and they operate like a business. Although they have a volunteer board, they have staff, and they have staff who are employed and who are providing the services the GNWT has asked them to provide.

I want to say again that this is not the right place for this to be. I’ve heard from a number of organizations that have stated that things were going extremely well through the Department of Executive. Relationships have been built up; NGOs understood what was supposed to be done by whom and when and how. Basically they’re going to have to start all over again and work things out again. We went through quite a difficult time initially to get the applications dealt with in a timely manner and I certainly hope that we can keep that so that NGOs can make an application early in April and get the money long before September, or December, which I think it was in that very first year.

I guess my question is: Is MACA willing to send it back to the Executive? This is not where it needs to be. Thank you.

That is a loaded question. I think it was felt that with our experience in dealing with the voluntary sector that it would be a good fit in MACA. Thank you.