Thank you, Member. I'll take that as a comment. Did the Minister have anything to follow-up?
Debates of March 9th, 2021
This is page numbers 2383 - 2438 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 work.
Topics
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Shane Thompson Nahendeh
I thank the Member for that, and we will have discussions. Nothing's a never-never, and here's maybe an opportunity to look at it. We will be having those discussions, but further detail, maybe get the deputy minister.
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Kelly
Thank you. These are community monitors and provides funding to guardians already. We have looked at those opportunities. The department has actually looked at some of the work where we would travel into communities. We've hired local residents to work with communities to do that work. Along the lines of what the Member has stated, we've been doing that work, and this line item, in particular, is how we get money out for community monitoring and the guardian programs that we support related to water. Thank you, Madam Chair.
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The Chair Lesa Semmler
Thank you, Deputy Minister. No further? Okay. Are there any further questions under the water management monitoring? Member for Hay River South.
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Rocky Simpson Hay River South
Thank you, Madam Chair. With respect to this section, what percentage of these funds go to funding or providing funding to Indigenous groups to participate in development of strategies and action plans. Thank you, Madam Chair.
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Kelly
Thank you, Madam Chair. It would depend on the year because it depends on what projects that we're doing. We have an Aboriginal steering committee that supports the implementation of the water strategy and has since we started to develop it, so those costs are always covered for the participation of the Aboriginal steering committee. Some years, we have traditional knowledge projects that we're working on, or community work that we're doing. Other years, we have more research, but under the Water Strategy, there is consistent work with communities because many of the action items are to work directly with communities on water issues. Thank you, Madam Chair.
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Rocky Simpson Hay River South
Thank you, Madam Chair. With respect to research and monitoring, what is the extent of monitoring that we do, and is it concentrated in a specific geographical area in the Northwest Territories? I suspect it's up and down the valley and throughout. The water coming into the NWT, we're going to see more contamination there, so I'm just wondering where we're doing most of our monitoring and where most of those dollars are going. Thank you, Madam Chair.
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Shane Thompson Nahendeh
Thank you. We do have various sites across there, and we're making sure, as the deputy minister said, if there's early warning systems we have in place and we're able to see if there's contaminants coming down. For detail on where the sites are, I'll go, with your permission, to the deputy minister. Thank you.
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Kelly
Thank you, Madam Chair. There's different types of water monitoring that we do across the territory. There's hydrometric monitoring, which is water quantity monitoring. In the Beau-Del region, there's 27 sites; in the Sahtu, 22; in the Dehcho, 17, in the North Slave, 28; and in the South Slave, there's 10. They're distributed across the territory.
Another example is the community-based water quality monitoring that we do. There're five different monitoring -- it's with communities. There're five communities in the Beau-Del region. There're 11 sites that are monitored with the communities in the Sahtu; nine in the Dehcho; seven in the North Slave; and six in the South Slave. There's also meteorological monitoring that's mostly focused in the Beau-Del and the North Slave, and there's snow surveys that are done across the whole territory, as well. There're the trans-boundary water quality sites: one in the Beau-Del on the Peel; the Dehcho on the Liard; and two, one on the Hay and one on the Slave, in the South Slave. Then we have a water quality network with 22 stations in the North Slave and 10 in the South Slave. Thank you, Madam Chair.
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Rocky Simpson Hay River South
Thank you, Madam Chair. With respect to water monitoring, in the land claim agreements, there're specific sections, I think, for that. When we're looking at this, how do we incorporate what's in the agreements with respect to what we're doing in managing and participation from Indigenous groups? Thank you, Madam Chair.
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Shane Thompson Nahendeh
Thank you. For that detail, I'll have to turn to the deputy minister. Thank you.
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Kelly
Thanks, Madam Chair. When we were developing the water strategy, there were a number of things that we looked up, and land claim commitments were one of the main foundations for the Water Stewardship Strategy. There were a lot of concerns that were being brought forward about water because it's so important to people in the NWT, and we worked collaboratively with Indigenous governments and other water partners across the NWT to come up with that water strategy. Really, it was the foundation for the mandate for the transboundary agreements, as well. The Aboriginal steering committee is key. They have guided us. They guided the transboundary negotiations. They've guided all of the aspects of development and implementation of the water strategy. We've got the land claims as the foundation, and then we've got Indigenous participation the whole way through development and implementation. I hope that that answers the Member's question. Thank you, Madam Chair.
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Rocky Simpson Hay River South
Thank you, Madam Chair. The other question I have is with respect to the monitoring and management is: is there any case law out there that's available, any challenges with upstream industries and that, doing work up there? Has there been any challenges from any of the Indigenous groups or the Government of the Northwest Territories to challenge? There's pulp mills or mining companies that may have potential damage for waters coming into the Northwest Territories. Thank you, Madam Chair.
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