Upon re-election, what do you plan to accomplish in your first 90 days, what about a year?
In the first 90 days we will have a new Premier and new Cabinet who will hopefully be solidifying ties with their Federal counterparts and establishing a fiscal framework that can support the aspirations of the 20th Assembly.
My goals for the first year will depend on my role in government.
As a government, we need to be part of the decision-making on the Taltson project design and commercial structure. We need to press the advance of any remaining regulatory filings in support of the Mackenzie Valley Highway. We should ensure that the Federal government prioritizes the Regional Strategic Environmental Assessment within the Slave Geologic and advances work at our Regional Energy and Resource Table which is supposed to be our access point into Federal funding for critical minerals, among other things. We must also ensure that the Federal government follows through on making telecommunications redundancy an essential service to improve the security and availability of services in the NWT.
What are the most pressing issues you plan to address during your time in office?
Reduce our NWT reliance on expensive trucked diesel for all of our energy and heating needs. Followed closely by ensuring our health care system is sustainable by providing a healthy workplace for healthcare professionals, system accountability and examining funding policies to ensure preventive care and social determinants of health while avoiding mandate creep.
That said, what issues one member can personally address depends on each of our roles in government. Many of the big challenges facing the NWT will require a whole of government response and also whole of Assembly prioritization.
What is your plan to bring workers to the north, and keep residents in the NWT?
Work towards a strong economy with quality jobs, improve the availability of housing for those accepting these jobs, maintain positive educational opportunities for residents and their families and ensure the availability of a sustainable health care system to preserve quality of life.
As housing prices continue to rise, do you have plans to address the needs of those struggling to live in the north?
Costs of living and doing business in the north are well known to be higher than comparable communities in southern Canada. Key drivers of high costs are energy and transportation which contribute to high costs both directly as well as indirectly in terms of the higher costs for local goods and services.
We need to pursue pathways off diesel and modernization of energy infrastructure capable of adapting to new technologies including intermittent renewables. The NTPC needs to significantly increase its commercial customer base so that residential consumers are not responsible for bearing the costs of the much needed infrastructure modernization and expansion. That may require partnerships or other advance agreements to support the development of infrastructure that will then allow the commercial customer base to actually grow.
We also need to maintain all of our supply routes to avoid further spikes in the cost of essential goods and supplies. For air routes that means advocating for reasonable pilot hours and runways that can support modern aircraft. For the barges, we need harbour restoration.
On the other side of high costs is high wages: we should ensure a strong and prosperous economy that can help maintain and grow the number of high paying jobs. In addition to providing better energy, heat and transportation options describe above, we need to support a strong labor market. We need to ensure our students are healthy and appropriately educated to meet these labor market needs and that the education opportunities align to near future labor market needs. We should incentivize new housing construction at affordable price points so that incoming prospective employees have somewhere to live and existing residents can maintain their housing and remain in the workforce. Economic development including housing development relies on the availability of land which in turn requires land certainty. We should continue to prioritize land claim settlements.
Due to the rise in drug crime and homelessness in the territory and its communities, can you describe the number one crime-related issue you plan on addressing first?
We should address the social and human needs that are too often the underlying causes for criminal behaviour; for example, housing availability, social indicators of health, primary care, mental wellness and cultural wellbeing.
However, some of the most vulnerable persons often have the most difficulty accessing services particularly when a suite of services are needed.
The Integrated Case Management (ICM) office should be expanded. ICM provides case management support and pathfinding for clients dealing with at least one government service such as income assistance, housing, child and family services, mental health services, etc. and has very positive outcomes from clients who may have otherwise struggled to coordinate and manage all of their needs.
A community safety office pilot is underway in Fort Liard but should also be piloted in one of the larger regional centres. The Community Safety Officer Pilot Program is meant to be a community-driven initiative that focuses on crime prevention strategies and relationship building between the community, service providers and the RCMP.
