Check against delivery

Mr. Speaker, every community in the Northwest Territories is different and has different needs and priorities. I am pleased to say that our Community Housing Support Program recognizes these differences and puts the priorities of local people right in the center of our planning processes. 

We recognize that local people have the clearest understanding of their needs, and often of the best solutions too.  For this reason, the NWT Housing Corporation works in partnership with Indigenous governments and community agencies to develop innovative,
community-driven housing projects of their own design.   This helps ensure local priorities are met with a variety of support options such as grants and other contributions. Support may also be in the form of policy and program design, material packages, technical expertise, land management, or surplus units when appropriate.

Mr. Speaker, I have spoken about this program in the past in this Legislative Assembly and would like to provide an update today. Previously, I spoke about this program adding affordable housing to the Salt River First Nation, implementing a repair program in Fort Good Hope, and a log home project in Colville Lake among other successes.

Today I would like to note even more recent successes for this program. The K’atlodeeche First Nation has used the Community Housing Support Program to implement a repair program for homes in the community. Programs like this give the community the ability to locally prioritize any repair work they want to get done.

Mr. Speaker, the Hamlet of Aklavik has used funding through this program to connect to a biomass heating system. Innovative, forward-thinking, locally-driven projects like this are why we believe this program is so valuable to communities across the NWT.

In Inuvik, the Community Housing Support Program has been accessed by Teepee Housing in order to renovate multiple buildings. Being able to modernize affordable housing units is another example of this program being used to turn local ambitions into reality.

Mr. Speaker, one of my priorities as Minister is partnership, and this program is a great example of how by listening to each other and working together, we can make progress towards many of our shared goals. We all look forward to seeing these new projects being provided in accordance with community aspirations and recommendations. I look forward to speaking about the Community Housing Support Program in later sittings of this Legislative Assembly, sharing even more success stories.

Mahsi, Mr. Speaker.