Thank you, Minister. Mr. Schauerte.
Debates of Feb. 23rd, 2021
This is page numbers 2019 - 2082 of the Hansard for the 19th Assembly, 2nd Session. The original version can be accessed on the Legislative Assembly's website or by contacting the Legislative Assembly Library. The word of the day was communities.
Topics
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Schauerte
Thank you, Madam Chair. I think our department objective would try to be as consistent as possible with seniors programming. I think the seniors want that from government. They want predictability in terms of how they are going to be treated with respect to different programming. As we go forward with the review of this legislation, we are also going to talk to seniors and seniors organizations, and I am sure that they are going to have opinions on whether means testing should be part of a legislative proposal.
We are not at that stage yet with our legislative proposal or our research. I wouldn't want to say definitively whether or not that is something that is going to be part of our legislative work going forward, but we are going to talk to people. We are going to listen to them and hear from them and inform our legislative proposal accordingly. At the end of the day, the bill would be before the House for their consideration on those kinds of matters. I wouldn't want to suggest that that is going to be part of the bill at this stage, Madam Chair.
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Katrina Nokleby Great Slave
I don't have another question, but I am just going to take a moment to plug for the seniors. I don't think that we should do the income testing because I think they contribute in so many other ways, and we do want them to stay. As one pointed out to me, we get $37,000 a year for them, so I will just leave it at that. Thank you.
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Steve Norn Tu Nedhe-Wiilideh
Marsi cho, Madam Chair. I am just looking at the directorate on page 338 and some of the activity descriptions on this. We have the municipal funding gap we have to deal with, and it just feels like we are constantly finding ways to pivot and to find some solutions to close that gap and find ways to get funds out to our 33 communities. Aside from doing things on this side of the House, what has the department been doing in terms of finding ways to streamline and to get more funds out to the communities? Thank you.
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Paulie Chinna Sahtu
Thank you, Madam Chair. I prepared for this briefing. I am thinking I have read everything that I have and everything is in the top of my head, but we did get some additional funding this year. It did go towards sports and recreation and operations with the contribution, as well, of $2.5 million towards the municipal funding gap. However, I will have Ms. Eleanor Young elaborate on that because we did do a distribution out to the communities this year. Thank you, Madam Chair.
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Young
Thank you, Madam Chair. If I am understanding the question correctly, you are looking at, beyond the mandate money, what else are we doing to get money out to communities. Am I understanding the question correctly?
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Young
Thank you, Madam Chair. I could talk about this quite a bit because there are quite a number of areas, but I will try to highlight a few areas that we have really focused on. For operating expenses within communities, we have put a lot of effort in the last couple of years in an asset-management strategy and trying to support communities to put policies and procedures in place to extend the life of their assets as long as possible and try to turn focus from emergency repairs and emergency maintenance into investing in and extending the lifespan of their assets as long as possible. That helps reduce operating costs, but it also helps extend the lifespan of the assets and reduce the amount of capital investment as quickly. That is one area as an example.
Another area that we have spent a lot of time in is trying to help community governments access federal infrastructure funding, and we have been very successful at that over a number of years. We are currently operating roughly five different federal infrastructure programs to communities and supporting them in every way possible to achieve the cost-share, write proposals, and get to as much federal support as possible so that they can take their CPI investment from the GNWT and stretch it as far as possible. Those would be two examples. However, when it comes to operations, we have tried wherever possible to look at what are the cost drivers for community governments and what can we do to support them to mitigate those cost drivers, extend the lifespan of their assets, reduce their operating costs, or access additional funding. I would say it covers all of those areas. Thank you, Madam Chair.
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Steve Norn Tu Nedhe-Wiilideh
Thank you, Madam Chair. Thank you for the response. It gives me a little bit more. It gives me a better idea where I need to go with this next question. We have 33 communities, and a lot of the communities are not like our larger centres where you could just consult with the mayors and whatnot. I know we have a lot of smaller communities, First Nations, for example, that the chiefs usually are the heads in that capacity. Has there been a lot of consultation stuff? I am thinking in terms of the business plans for MACA or the long-term business plans. Has there been a lot of consultation with the chiefs in our small communities? Thank you.
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Paulie Chinna Sahtu
Thank you, Madam Chair. Yes, there has been a lot of consultation. We do meet with the chiefs and mayors. Since COVID-19, that communication has increased, looking at what the significant need would be at the community level. Thank you, Madam Chair.
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Steve Norn Tu Nedhe-Wiilideh
Thank you, Madam Chair. Just a quick comment: hopefully, we could just get ahead, this being one of our mandate items, to keep picking away and keep persevering. Like I said, our goal should be to try to leave the state of our house in a better state than it was in before, so hopefully we can make lots of headway on this. Marsi cho.
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Rylund Johnson Yellowknife North
Thank you, Madam Chair. Can I get a timeline on when the department started work on the Fire Prevention Act? Thank you, Madam Chair.
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Paulie Chinna Sahtu
Thank you, Madam Chair. I do not know a specific date. I will have Mr. Gary Schauerte respond as to when the work had started. Thank you, Madam Chair.
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