Dysfunction, ignorance, incompetence at Hall Beach housing association

I am writing this letter to expose some issues that Hall Beach Housing Association has within the community, as it makes me wonder if the other local housing associations within Nunavut have the same issues.
 
First and foremost, how can a community of 700 people owe $1.8 million to the local housing association? This is a community of 700 people where there isn’t a high number of employed people.

Hall Beach isn’t one of the Government of Nunavut’s decentralized communities, so the only possible employment available is with places such as the Northern Store, Hamlet, Housing Association and Co-op store, and so on.
 
I know Hall Beach might be a special exception, because they’ve been on and off without a housing manager. but those who do act in that position should be at least be educated enough to pull the ropes and run the public housing association well.

I know that in Nunavut we do have a housing crisis, but when a community of 700 is in rent arrears for $1.8 million, that’s enough to pay for at least two or three new housing units.
 
Everyone knows everyone in a community of 700. Not all community citizens are educated on when they have to remember that every year they have to sign tenancy agreements and other housing agreement forms.

Most that have been living in public housing know all this but some new young tenants don’t know this and in a community of 700,  they are very likely not well-educated either.

Therefore I do believe that the Tenant Relations Officer should make an attempt to contact everyone on the list just once a year — I’m sure it’s worth the salary!

Send a letter once, twice then a third time and if there’s no response, go visit the house. It’s already owned by public housing so they might as well knock on the door to make sure that all the money is accounted for in that particular unit.
 
One example is a young couple on income support who were charged maximum rent charge because the letter that the tenant relation officer sent to them once a year got lost in the mail. The young couple didn’t know that they have to do the income form once a year so, without hesitation or contacting the young tenants, they decided to just max the rent.

How are they ever going to pay that debt when they’re on income support? And is there a way to go back, keeping in mind the young couple didn’t know and it’s good enough excuse for the housing to re-charge the rent? Do other housing associations in Nunavut do that too?
 
Another example is a single mother who is on income support. The income support worker has been asking for a form from the housing association, but the tenant relations officer keeps giving them the wrong form.

So the income support worker cannot even pay the month’s rent because there’s a form that the local housing is confused with and cannot provide to the income support office in time, which then drags on for months because the single mother cannot waste anyone’s time anymore. Even if she does, her message is not getting through, so therefore she’s just billed month after month for rent that she can’t pay.
 
Another example is a when an employed person went to the local housing association to have her rent deducted from her pay cheque in December 2009. They finally started taking rent charges from her cheque this July. I wonder if the employee can just do it on their own. But can we trust the Hall Beach housing association with it?
 
Last year, there were some new units completed but they haven’t been able to place tenants in for like nine months because — as we later found out — the back door was the wrong color. I’m laughing my head off.

The contractors must have been in a hurry to finish it so that people could move in, but the local housing authority had other things in mind — unfortunately the back door was the wrong color.

And with those same units, letters were sent out to possible tenants and these people were given hope that they would move in within the next few months, only to have their hopes crushed when housing placed other tenants in these units. 

If I were on that first list and was given a letter saying that I would be moving in, only to find out later that a totally new bunch of people moved in, I’d take them to court.  No explanations were given and their names were not even on the waiting list anymore.
 
It’s amazing how much public housing tenants in Hall Beach have to put up with from the local housing association. They go for months without seeing a statement showing them how much they owe or how much rent they should pay in a month.
 
I am not even sure if the local housing committee has a say in anything at all or why they don’t have monthly meetings. I don’t even know why we have local housing committees. They’re basically useless here in Hall Beach.
 
Some people have been trying to get on the waiting list for ages. Sometimes housing tells them they owe money. Other times they just say that they haven’t had a meeting yet, but everyone in town knows that they don’t have meetings.
 
Like, what exactly are they doing from 8:30 a.m. to 5:00 p.m. every day?

The bills aren’t being sent, the annual agreement forms are not being done properly, they’re not taking in new people. Doesn’t it make you wonder what exactly they’re doing in the office?

Are all local housing associations in Nunavut like that?

(Editor, please withold my name because I don’t want to be removed from the waiting list for housing.)
 
(Name withheld by request)
Hall Beach

Email your letters to editor@nunatsiaq.com.

Nunatsiaq News welcomes letters to the editor. But we are under no obligation to publish any given letter at any given time.

In our print edition, we usually print letters on a first-come, first-served, space-available basis. In our online edition, we usually print letters as soon as we are able to prepare them for publication.

We edit all letters for length, grammar, punctuation, spelling, taste and libel. You may withhold your name by request, but we must know who you are before we publish your letter.