Through its Market Housing Program, the Northwest Territories Housing Corporation is mandated to provide housing units at market rent to "critical staff" in non-market communities. This includes the community of Fort Providence. Here in the House, on March 3rd, we heard that the Housing Corporation currently has 133 market rentals across most non-market communities, and that the corporation plans to increase their stock to 205 units within the next year. But I'm hearing from my constituents, and observing in the communities in my riding, that this program is not working in our small communities. In Fort Providence, two modular units were intended for delivery. One was delivered in January 2016, but has sat empty for almost a full year. As for the second unit, it was not delivered after local businesses expressed their concerns that importing units into the community would disrupt the local market. For example, two local businesses already provide rental property.
Mr. Speaker, further, as a few of my colleagues have talked about right here in the House, bringing in modular units may help the housing corporation keep costs down, but it doesn't do much at all for local employment. In contrast, Mr. Speaker, consider recent renovations to the seniors' home. For that project, local people were employed for the duration of construction. Mr. Speaker, there are projects that help both the government and our small communities, and there are projects that don't. I'll have questions for the Minister later today. Mahsi.