Nunavut MLA demands public housing unit

Tununiq MLA Joe Enook (left) with South Baffin MLA Fred Schell at the fall sitting of the Nunavut legislature. Enook claims the Nunavut Housing Corp. is unfairly preventing him from taking a subsidized social housing unit in Pond Inlet. (PHOTO BY SARAH ROGERS)

Joe Enook, the newly-elected MLA for Tununiq, is demanding that the Nunavut Housing Corp. grant permission for him to rent a subsidized public housing unit in Pond Inlet.

And he says he feels hurt and betrayed that the Government of Nunavut won’t let that happen.

When Enook was elected MLA in a Sept. 12 by-election, he had been living in Iqaluit for more than a decade and a half, working as a vice-president of Nunasi Corp.

During his campaign, he promised voters that if elected, he would move back to Pond Inlet.

So Enook applied to the local housing association for a public housing unit.

Despite a lengthy waiting list for units in the community, the housing association offered him a vacant house.

Enook said his application is backed by an unsolicited letter from the hamlet council and he also claims the support of the community.

“Everyone said ‘We want our MLA to live here and we want him to be prioritized,’” Enook told Nunatsiaq News. “This is an initiative the community of Pond Inlet has taken and I’m very appreciative.”

But the Nunavut Housing Corp. stepped in to deny the allocation, telling Enook in a letter this week that, for one thing, he’s disqualified from social housing because he makes more than $85,000 a year.

Enook claims to make a base salary of between $90,000 and $100,000.

The housing corporation’s allocation policies state that social housing must be allocated on the basis of need and that those in greatest need should get help first.

The corporation’s eligibility criteria include:

• residency: the applicant must meet a residency requirement, usually three to six months of residency in a community;

• income: the applicant’s gross annual household income must not be greater than a certain minimum level, usually between $80,000 and $94,500, depending on the community;

• good standing: the applicant must not owe money to the housing corporation.

Housing associations, which manage social housing in the communities on behalf of the corporation, are supposed to allocate housing on the basis of a point system.

Some of the criteria that go into that point system include:

• time spent on waiting list for housing;

• victims of violence: extra points can be given if this is documented by the RCMP or social workers;

• lower income: applicants get extra points if their gross income is low;

• poor health: an applicant may get extra points if their current accommodation is damaging to their health.

In May of 2008, the Auditor General of Canada found the housing corporation did a poor job of ensuring that local housing organizations allocated units according to this system.

In response, the corporation promised to ensure that housing associations allocate units correctly in the future.

Tagak Curley, the minister responsible for the housing corporation, won’t comment on the issue while correspondence between the two parties continues, Curley’s office said Nov. 9.

Now Enook says he feels he has “no rights” to defend himself as an MLA.

And if people think he’s using his power as MLA to benefit himself, they’re “absolutely wrong,” he said.

“I’ve tried to stay out of this as much as possible,” he said. “I can’t seem as though I’m trying to influence the decision because of my position.”

Enook says he has the same right as any other Inuk to apply for social housing.

He said he even met with Nunavut’s integrity commissioner — as required of new MLAs — and “cleared up” issues like social housing.

Enook says he and his wife first looked at private homes, but “unfortunately, there’s nothing in the form of a private rental available in Pond Inlet right now,” he said.

“I hate to tell them at NHC, but I can see a dozen or more residents in Pond Inlet alone who make a lot more than $85,000 a year and they live in public housing,” he said.

So Enook and his wife have been living in a shack ever since they moved to Pond Inlet last Thursday.