Housing headed for communities with the highest needs

By SAMANTHA DAWSON

Are you in line for a public housing unit in Nunavut?

Then you’ll be interested to learn that Peter Taptuna, the minister responsible for the Nunavut Housing Corporation, announced May 15 in the Nunavut legislature which Nunavut communities can expect to see new public housing units built by the end of 2014.

Here’s where the first new 210 units will be built — a list that’s still subject to change, Taptuna said:

• Iqaluit — 30 units;

• Repulse Bay — 20 units;

• Arviat — 30 units;

• Clyde River — 20 units;

• Coral Harbour — 10 units;

• Kugluktuk — 20 units;

• Baker Lake — 30 units;

• Rankin Inlet — 20 units;

• Whale Cove — five units;

• Taloyoak — 10 units;

• Cambridge Bay — 10 units; and,

• Igloolik — five units.

Figures from the 2010 Nunavut Housing Needs Survey for overcrowding helped calculate the community ranking.

This ranking used the wait list compared with the number of public housing units in each community as a gauge of the need for more housing.

“Using the wait list alone would result in only the largest communities being served [because they have more people waiting for housing] — this methodology ensures that units are allocated fairly,” Taptuna said May 15.

By also taking into account each community’s specific construction costs, and its capacity to absorb more new housing, Nunavut can get more for its money, he said.

Ottawa said this past March that it would provide $100 million in new money for additional public housing in Nunavut, through the Canada Housing and Mortgage Corporation, as part of its proposed 2013/14 budget.

“The Nunavut Housing Corp. was pleased with this announcement, and is committed to maximizing the quantity of housing it can provide to Nunavummiut, while ensuring a fair allocation of units to communities, by addressing those with the greatest needs first,” Taptuna said in his May 15 minister’s statement.

The method developed by the NHC on how to allocate the housing was also used for the $8 million in GN money that’s going towards the construction of new public housing units in Arviat and Clyde River, he said.

Because Nunavut is at “a critical point” in its housing crisis,Taptuna said “it is imperative that we maximize the number of units built with this additional funding.”

The NHC also consulted with the Department of Community and Government Services and the Qulliq Energy Corp. to make sure the communities slated for new housing have enough capacity with respect to power generation and distribution, fuel tank farms, water reservoir and delivery capacity, and land availability.

The NHC is currently negotiating an agreement with Canadian Housing and Mortgage Corp. for the $100 million to give the GN more flexibility in how it contracts for various aspects of the housing construction. However, no agreement can be signed until the federal budget is passed in the House of Commons at the end of June, Taptuna said.