Thank you, Madam Chair.
Rylund Johnson

Roles
In the Legislative Assembly
Elsewhere
Crucial Fact
- His favourite word was know.
Last in the Legislative Assembly October 2023, as MLA for Yellowknife North
Won his last election, in 2019, with 36% of the vote.
Statements in the House
Thank you, Madam Chair. I appreciate it, and I look forward to seeing that. I believe it is quite a high return on investment, especially up here, once again, if you get an artist to meet certain qualifications, they can go access Canadian Council for the Arts funding.
I just want to get a sense of how much of this arts funding is for artists in communities, because I believe that's really the market we need to look to develop.
Thank you, Madam Chair. I appreciate those comments, and the standing committee will be taking out the Official Languages Act, so I look forward to continued conversations. I, ultimately, believe that we don't necessarily need to be the flow through. If the feds are willing to fund the Indigenous governments directly, that's great.
I wanted to switch gears here and talk about the line items. Arts, organizations and operations funding and the NWT arts council. There's a number of fundings for arts here. Just, generally, do we have a sense for every dollar we invest in the arts, what the return on investment is?
Thank you, Madam Chair. I'm glad to see we're spending $6,285,000 on Indigenous languages. I believe Mr. Norn already asked some questions about how this was oversubscribed one year. I know there's more and more federal money on the table, and I believe every time we invest in this, it allows our Indigenous governments to leverage that additional funding for Indigenous languages. I guess my question to the Minister is: are there any plans to increase this amount?
Thank you, Madam Chair. I'm looking at the funding for Indigenous languages, $6,285,000. I believe this is largely flow through money to Indigenous governments to run their programming. I know there's been a number of federal increases to Indigenous languages programming. I'm just wondering if this is all GNWT money or this includes the federal funding that exists for Indigenous languages.
Thank you, Madam Chair. This is an issue I will look into further and have further conversations with whether we can either increase that donation amount or look what other museums are doing. I wanted to move onto the line item $6,285,000 for Indigenous languages. Can I just confirm that this is all GNWT funding, or is this also federal funding in there?
Thank you, Madam Chair. I'm happy to hear those conversations we're having. I think I'm kind of on the side that we should be charging. Can I get a sense, do we know what the donation total is on an annual basis?
Thank you, Madam Chair. I had to Google, just so everyone is aware. Charles is the Prince of Wales. I didn't actually know that. I would be very happy if we changed the name of that. Talking about the Crown is one of my favourite topics. Madam Chair, my question is, I really think and need to emphasize that our museum is for the entire territory, and we have some of the most unique, cultural history in the world here, and our museum's job is essential to preserving that. I wanted to speak briefly about revenues.
I love the museum. Increasingly, it has more and more tourists going through it, and I want to emphasize that I think it should always be free for the Northwest Territories residents. I look at all the tourists who go in there, and it's completely free, and I wonder why we're not making some money off of that, and perhaps it could be in a revolving fund or something. My question is: has there ever been any consideration about charging those tourists to access the museum?
Question 142-19(2): Arnica Inn Transitional Housing Project March 3rd, 2020
Thank you, Madam Speaker. The Yellowknife Women's Society has reached out to the Housing Corporation throughout this process. They have reached out to almost everyone in this House. There has been nothing but attempts to reach out to the Housing Corporation and work with them. My concern is: on one hand, the Housing Corporation Minister is talking about not wanting to set people up for failure, wanting to make sure we have a strong investment, which I support. Yet, on the other hand, they are saying they are not even part of the application process. There is a deadline on here. I do not want the Housing Corporation, once the CMHC has provided their funding, to all of a sudden raise some new concerns that should have been raised months ago. My question for the Minister responsible for the Housing Corporation is: can we set out a guideline of what our role is in making sure we can successfully get the co-housing federal money from the federal government? Thank you, Madam Speaker.
Question 142-19(2): Arnica Inn Transitional Housing Project March 3rd, 2020
I am a little perplexed that, at this point with such a close deadline, the Housing Corporation has not seen the application and isn't aware of the shortfalls. I heard the Minister responsible for the Housing Corporation previously discuss not wanting to set proponents up to fail, wanting to make sure, if we are going to provide our funding for any housing project, that we know that it is sustainable. I do not understand how the Housing Corporation is capable of doing that without looking at the response from CMHC and without knowing the shortfalls in the application. My question is: is the Housing Corporation, then, fully relying on the judgment of CMHC to commit their money? Have we done any review of the application?