Thank you, Minister. Member for Hay River South.

Thank you, Madam Chair. The Minister mentioned outhouses, and my ears perked up. That is one of the problems we usually run into. It's usually during the spring. They get used during the winter. We have wooden outhouses. Of course, the wood just absorbs the smell, and usually, they fill up. The thing is, what I would like to see is we consider looking at concrete washrooms, because it's easier to go in and wash them down. Of course, it will still smell, but it won't be embedded in the wood. Is that something that your department would consider? Thank you, Madam Chair.

Thank you, Member. Minister.

Thank you, Madam Chair. I would assume that the Department of Infrastructure, actually, probably looks at how the outhouses will be built. I will take this back as a comment to both departments and say, "Have we considered something that makes a little bit more sense from a cleaning standpoint," and we can definitely throw the COVID urgency on top of that. Thank you, Madam Chair.

Thank you, Minister. Member.

Thank you, Madam Chair. I guess, just in closing here, I would like to make a comment, and I would like to say that, in the South Slave there, I am pretty impressed with the way the parks are operated. They are looked after pretty well. The park manager is doing a good job, and the staff seem to be doing a good job, as well. I really appreciate that. They seem to be responsive. Yes. Good job. Just the outhouses. Thank you, Madam Chair.

Thank you, Member. I will take that as a comment. Member for Frame Lake.

Thanks, Madam Chair. I just want to pick up on a few points made by some of my colleagues, and we'll start with the outhouse issue. If the Minister digs down into her pile from the previous Assembly, she will see that there were a number of complaints about the 60^th parallel outhouse in particular. I don't know what it was like this spring, but there were photos sent to me. They were shared with the previous ITI Minister. The Minister made a commitment to try to improve the cleaning regimen, so I don't know whatever happened, but, if the Minister digs down far enough in her pile, she'll find all of that in files with her department, I'm sure.

I want to go on to support for Tuktoyaktuk with a visitors' centre. I had a chance to go up to the community last summer, drive the road. Once you get there, there's really not a lot to do. There's nowhere to stay. There's no campground. We just kind of parked out at the point for a while, walked around. The hamlet actually had to have a guy sitting in a truck all night long to just watch what people are doing out at the point. It's not a great place to be. The community needs more help. This was a problem of the Department of Infrastructure planning a road but not planning for the impacts on the community and supporting the community in developing the tourism potential. If we're going to plan roads, you've got to make sure that the community is supported to deal with the travel that's going to come with it. That clearly didn't happen with Tuktoyaktuk, and now I'm worried with what's going to happen with Whati because the road is going in there. Some of us who were in the last Assembly, we had a retreat at a fishing lodge on Lac La Martre. Great fishing, nice place, but, if a road goes in there, what assistance is being provided to the community to get prepared for the traffic that's going to come in there? I'm worried in particular about what's going to happen with fishing on that lake because there are going to be a lot of people from Yellowknife who are going to want to go in there and fish. If it's not controlled in some way, it's not going to be good. I'd like to know from the department what kind of planning is going on to assist the community of Whati to get better prepared for the tourism? Thanks, Madam Chair.

Thank you, Member. Minister.

Thank you, Madam Chair. I'm just going to first address the comments about the outhouse. I'm well aware. I've been around. I've heard about the outhouses. This year, with COVID, we have a $74,000 increase for funding to clean our washrooms in our parks, so that should hopefully have been taken care of. I would urge any of the Members that, if they hear otherwise, to please let me know.

Like all our other communities, we are working with Whati to develop their tourism strategy and what they would like to see in their community. They did come to our recent tourism AGM, I believe my first gala as Minister. I'm going to pass this over to Ms. St-Denis to provide more details as to the work we're doing with the community of Whati. Thank you, Madam Chair.

Thank you, Minister. Ms. St-Denis.

Thank you, Ms. St-Denis. Member for Frame Lake.

Thanks, Madam Chair. Great to hear that, and I look forward to seeing some of the products from that work. I've raised this with my colleague with ENR. I think we have to look at fishing restrictions on Lac La Martre sometime soon before the road gets finished, to protect the fish resources there, so I'm just going to leave that with you folks, and I'll probably come back and ask about it at some future point.

With regard to overall tourism promotion, clearly, we're not going to get much international or even domestic tourism from other parts of Canada this summer. What is the department doing to try to promote tourism within the NWT? Thanks, Madam Chair.

Thank you, Member. Minister.

Thank you, Madam Chair. We are having many discussions within the department about the "staycation," for lack of a better word, program. We're definitely going to be focusing our marketing efforts on getting people to move around within the territory while we can't move outside of it. Northwest Territories tourism has provided free promotional advertising opportunities to their members. We are launching a campaign to "buy north, stay north," so, anything that we maybe would have been focusing this summer externally, outside of the territory, we will be reallocating those resources back towards internal and residents. If we should enter into any sort of agreements with other provinces or territories to open up borders, then, we would also be extending to those people, as well. Thank you, Madam Chair.

Thank you, Minister. Member for Frame Lake.

Thanks, Madam Chair. One of the ideas that I raised with the Premier the other day was this idea of a travel bubble, and it's been in the news in some other jurisdictions. It'd be great if we could have a way where the Yukon, Nunavut and Northwest Territories residents could travel across the territorial borders to visit each other's jurisdictions for summer holidays. I really want to see that idea pursued by Cabinet.

I want to raise one other issue while I still have three minutes on the clock. It's about the lack of a proper visitors' centre in Yellowknife. About 500 metres south of us here, we, a few weeks ago, witnessed the demolition of the former Northern Frontier Visitors' Centre. I'd like to know what the department's plans are to contribute towards a proper visitors' centre for Yellowknife? Thanks, Madam Chair.

Thank you, Member. Minister.

Thank you, Madam Chair. We are currently working with the City of Yellowknife as we fund them to provide visitors' services in Yellowknife. That is our centre, our hub, for the rest of our tourism communities or destinations. Currently, we've provided the city with $160,000 to operate the Yellowknife Visitors' Centre. They are reviewing plans to implement their visitors' services strategy. The new territorial visitors' information centre is one that ITI does support. However, we do want to recognize and acknowledge that it will be to facilitate people also leaving outside of Yellowknife. It's not going to be a Yellowknife-centric visitors' centre. It will be for the entire Northwest Territories. We know that many visitors are looking for digital information, so Northwest Territories Tourism has strategically taken a step to enhance their website and digital presence. The department has been working to find potential partners to share with this investment. As our work progresses, I will continue to provide updates to the Member. Thank you, Madam Chair.

Thank you, Minister. Member for Frame Lake.

Thanks, Madam Chair. Yes, I'm well aware of the $160,000 that's provided to the city. That's the same amount that was given to the Northern Frontier Visitors' Association that eventually resulted in the building going kaput with the lack of support from our government. That was, I think, a major contributing factor in my view. It was in my riding, as well. Is there any money specifically above and beyond the $160,000 in this budget to help with planning and development of a proper visitors' centre in Yellowknife? Thanks, Madam Chair.

Thank you, Member. Minister.

Thank you, Madam Chair. I believe, Madam Chair, the department has provided the Member with a response to this to an email request that he could then refer to for more information. We are having conversations with the City of Yellowknife, and, when they have identified what their strategy will be in conjunction with our department, we will help them in supporting them to look for the funding to build whatever they would like to build. Thank you, Madam Chair.