Ottawa gives Nunavut another $15 million for public housing

Nunavut MP Leona Aglukkaq and George Kuksuk, the minister responsible for the Nunavut Housing Corp, sign off on a five-year extension to the Investment in Affordable Housing Agreement Nov. 10 in Iqaluit. (PHOTO BY PETER VARGA)

Through an agreement signed Nov. 10 in Iqaluit, the Government of Nunavut received another $15 million to build public housing over the next five years.

George Kuksuk, the Nunavut minister responsible for the Nunavut Housing Corp. signed the deal at the legislative assembly building with Nunavut MP Leona Aglukkaq, the federal minister responsible for the northern territories.

The five-year $15 million fund is an extension of the Investment in Affordable Housing Agreement, which provided $100 million to the Nunavut Housing Corp. for construction of new units over a two-year period from 2013 to 2015.

That agreement provided $30 million for the fiscal year 2013-14 and $70 million for 2014-2015.

The deal signed Nov. 10 would provided an additional $15 million over five years.

“It’s a welcome sign that our persistent efforts to address Nunavut’s unique needs are being recognized,” Kuksuk said.

Kuksuk said the NHC first planned to start construction on 213 housing units in 2015.

The corporation managed to save an extra $10 million thanks to improvements, he said, that will be used to build an extra 45 units in Pond Inlet, Kugaaruk, and Arviat in 2015-16.

The extension of the funding agreement will bring an extra $1.455 million in to the NHC from the Canadian Mortgage and Housing Corporation every year, until 2019.

The Government of Nunavut will match this contribution, bringing the annual total to almost $3 million, and a net amount of $15 million over the next five years.

The NHC will spend the extra amounts in 2015-2016 on the 45 new units, said Lori Kimball, the corporation’s president and CEO.

“We’ve got to update our construction costs every year, based on what we actually see in bid-pricing and what’s going on [in the housing market], because the prices do change,” she told Nunatsiaq News at the signing ceremony.

The NHC will start building 15 units in each of Pond Inlet, Kugaaruk, and Arviat in 2015.

The units will be housed in three fiveplex buildings in each community, Kimball said.

“$1.455 million in Nunavut is welcome money but it doesn’t do a whole lot on its own,” said Kimball. “We do have to merge it with the GN funding so that we could do more with it.”

Aglukkaq said that the federal government has spent $490 million since 2006 “to deal with the shortage in affordable housing in Nunavut.”

“We are challenged with a very young population, a growing population,” she said.

“We are collectively, in partnership with Nunavut Housing Corp., working hard in trying to address the growth in our communities. It’s challenging to keep up with that.”