Nunavut’s public housing program draws MLA ire
Concerns over high rents and poor conditions brought to the legislative assembly
Patterk Netser, the minister responsible for the Nunavut Housing Corp., responded to questions about the territory’s rental program during the first few days of the legislative assembly’s fall session. (File photo)
The Nunavut Housing Corp.’s rent scale, which determines how much tenants pay, based on their income, should be reconsidered, says Cathy Towtongie.
The MLA for Rankin Inlet North–Chesterfield Inlet made the demand in the legislature on Monday, Oct. 21, while pressing for a review of the territory’s housing program.
Problems with overcrowding, the high cost of living and poor housing conditions persist in the territory under the current public housing program, she said.
Patterk Netser, the minister responsible for the Nunavut Housing Corp., responded: “We don’t have a five-year review program.”
Towtongie said that the housing corporation’s Blueprint for Action calls for it to “review possible development of a fixed-rent subsidized housing model targeting high-income public housing tenants, particularly those currently paying maximum rent in public housing.”
This action, among a list of 60, is geared towards looking at alternative models for subsidized housing to replace the current rent-tied-to-income model.
It goes on to say the housing corporation will look at options like co-ops and community land trusts, which allow for collective ownership among tenants.
“Can the minister update the house today on the specific actions Nunavut Housing Corp. has taken to accomplish this goal?” she asked.
Netser responded that the action plan on housing will take years to implement.
“It’s a work in progress and I can say we are working today on the 60 items of the program,” said Netser.
He added that the state of individual housing units is taken into account and, as of late, the housing corporation has readjusted the rent on units that were in particularly bad shape.
“For some people who are renting in these public units, and with the houses that are in poor condition, we lowered the cost of the rent,” said Netser. “Obviously, we’d like to give every person a home, but everyone knows we have a severe housing crisis and we’ve got to make do with what we’ve got.”
On Oct. 17, the first day of the fall sitting, Iqaluit-Niaqunnguu MLA Pat Angnakak also questioned the subsidized housing program, saying she is approached daily by constituents who are struggling with the cost of rent in the capital.
“My constituent described an experience of rent increase between 15 and 25 per cent, as well as arbitrary fees and charges well in excess of what is reasonable,” said Angnakak.
Under the Blueprint for Action, a study was completed looking at housing needs, including income and affordability levels.
Netser agreed housing affordability was a major concern for his own Aivilik constituents as well.
“I do hear from my constituents that once an individual starts working and earning an income, there is a dramatic rise in the rent that they pay,” Netser said. “That is a problem for all of the people of Nunavut.”
While he promised to look into the matter, he flatly refused to consider rent controls for the coming year.
Angnakak noted that across Canada, rent controls are in place limiting how much rent can increase within a year. For example, she gave British Columbia’s limit of 2.6 per cent per year.
Nunavut’s own Residential Tenancy Act prohibits rental increases from being made more than once a year, but does not cap the amount of the increase.
This stands for both public and private rentals.
“Will the minister commit to reviewing this provision with a goal of having stronger rent control in place next year?” she asked of Netser.
“I cannot do that,” Netser responded. “But I really want to work with the house on how we can address the rent scale.”
The GN is encouring the working man to be on welfare instead. Many have quit working because of rent increases. When an employee in Nunavut gets a raise or promotion, it all goes back to GN via the rent scale
Nunatsiaq, could you please provide more information on public housing rent amounts and the rent scaled based on income? Hard to evaluate anything without that info.
We were all there…
I couldn’t get a unit because I was making too much money, and I was a summer student!
When it finally came down to it; I was in between jobs, so technically I was unemployed. They gave me the unit right away after I told them them.
You increase your chances of getting a place if you are pregnant.
You pay $60 if you don’t make any money.
I feel obligated to quit my job, and make more kids while working under the table.
What community do you live in? I’m concerned they aren’t following the allocation rules. Having an income does not stop someone one from being allocated a unit and being pregnant plays no part in an allocation process either. Nor does having more children get you a unit faster, it just leaves you in a more overcrowded situation while you wait.
I wonder if he ever visited the very old units from 1950’s & 1960’s? Most moulded places that people still live in! Weren’t they suppose to be replaced? They really should visit each community and see, smell for themselves!
Tenants get sick. Babies get sick!
The Truth: Social housing is a joke, If Housing ran it as a “step-up” to homeownership and gave better incentives to actually own homes, you’d see a shift in mentality. Right now people are under the impression that they DESERVE to be given a home, rather then working towards owning one.
I always find it funny (as a homeowner) when I see posts on Facebook from social placements that complain that there is mold under their sink (clean more often then), there are holes in the bedroom doors (stop punching them when your mad or drunk), the windows won’t close properly in January because of ice buildup (then turn down the heat instead of opening the windows to cool the place down)…
As homeowners we get ZERO support. Something breaks we pay to fix it, something leaks we pay to fix it, we need insurance we pay for it (I pay more for insurance then some people I know pay for a full year of rent in their social housing). It doesn’t matter if I am working or not.
STOP putting money into a program (free social housing) which has an extremely limited shelf life… The next generation is not going to get housing ever, and overcrowding is only going to get worse unless there is better homeownership possibilities.
There are numerous homeownership programs that give copious amounts of money to homeowners for repairs. You just have to apply for them, and if you don’t owe money to NHC, it’s a near guarantee that you’ll be approved.
I hear a lot of public housing tenants whine and moan about what GN employees pay for staff housing, but what they say is just nonsense. I work for the GN. I was allocated a 2 bedroom unit at $1456/month. That is more than I’ve heard any public housing tenant is paying. In fact, most public housing tenants pay $60/month, and many never even pay the rent at that minuscule rate. People who don’t pay rent should be evicted and replaced with people who will pay rent.
I’m renting public housing, household of 10 and I’m paying $2100 a month for a 4 bedroom
How many leaseholders are living in the house? I am a single leaseholder in a very tiny unit.
Paying over $1600/month as a single person for my unit in staff housing.
I think it’s hilarious that you are complaining, when you are insanely lucky. You get guaranteed housing and you pay insanely cheap rates. it’s not relevant to compare your rental prices with those on low income, because you are a full-time incredibly high paid employee.
I am a Southerner making less than $70,000 a year and do not get staff housing. I pay almost your rate to share my place with multiple other people. I am not even complaining, because at this point you have to be lucky to get housing at all.
All those making $90,000 or more should not be getting staff housing and should pay the market rate. Then you will have a right to consider complaining.
Seems like some people, even in the legislative assembly need a crash course on how the Rentscale for public housing actually works.
Your rent subsidy is assessed based on your income tax return from the previous year. So let’s say I was on income support for 2018 and the beginning of 2019. My rent would be $60. Let’s say I get a GN job in June of 2019 making $1800 net pay every 2 weeks. Guess what, my rent stays at $60.00. In august I provide them a copy of my income tax from 2018 so they can assess my rent for Sept 1 (that’s when the subsidy changes) my line 150 is about $5000 because I was on income support so my rent stays at $60 for the next year. The money I started making in June 2019 doesn’t actually affect my rent until Sept 2020 and even still with making a net pay of $1800 every 2 weeks my rent would be around $1000 (but that would only happen in Sept 2021 because I didn’t work the full year in 2019), leaving me around $2600 a month for everything else. But then I get mad and say why did housing put my rent up so high, I’m being penalized for working, this isn’t fair, my rent should be $60.00 a month and I want it to be that. So I quit my job, give housing my ROE and they change my rent to $60 a month and I go back to getting $320.00 a month for everything that I need.
Also, the 25% rent increase is so your rent can’t go from $60 to $1000 in one shot. If your rent was $60 it can’t go higher than $75 for the next year.
And the reason there are no longer max rents is because it is almost impossible to kick tenants out for making too much money as there is a housing shortage, so there would be combined incomes of $180,000+ paying $1383.00 a month for a 3 bedroom. It’s supposed to be an incentive to move to staff housing or homeownership.
And I would like to clarify that I don’t work for housing I just know how the rentscale works and it helps people more than anyone really wants to believe/acknowledge but this is why some education on how it works is important.
So, I pay $1,756/month for my rent, 3 bedroom. Why do they need to include combined income? I need education on this so I might as well ask questions.
How many leaseholders are on the lease for your unit?
I agree with The Truth that the homeowner programs need more support and especially changed so they actually work. Right now every program out there is geared to low income households. Does it make sense to help a family buy or build a house they cannot afford to pay taxes, utilities, maintain and upkeep, of course not. My wife and I applied and we were told that the only way we could qualify is if one of us quit our jobs. We gave up because there is no way we could afford it, applied for social housing instead.The only reason the programs are set up this way is because of jealousy.
The current rent scale for staff housing is arbitrary too… Much of the old delapidated units that were built in the 70s/80s are larger than the brand new ones; however they charge rent based on square footage. My old two bedroom unit is $1500 a month, where the brand new modern 2-bed units (which are a bit smaller) go for about $1200 a month.
When I worked for a Municipality I quickly learned to budget my hard earned pay. Rent expectation was 30 percent of your net pay, I was told that is normal, so I had to get use to the idea, they said no matter where you are in Canada that is the norm. Now that I am a homeowner I see people in rental units with their windows wide open in the middle of winter. They seem to have no responsibility of what it costs to heat the house they live in. I have visited some friends/relatives with thermostat set very high – at least 24 celsius. It would be ideal if these social housing unit to have thermostats set at normal room temperature of 21 celsius and not higher, I have mine set at almost 20 celsius. There are complaints about people with jobs and getting a rental unit very quickly. People living in Government unit can have pluses and minuses. If you get a Government job in a small community, there is a very good possibilities that people would have to share an apartment – especially if they are single. I got a teaching job years ago and I could not get a Government unit because there was none, I could not get a social uinit because the Housing Association rules dictate that if a person work for the Government they did not qualify to get a social unit. So my teaching job only lasted one year. So therefore I got another job with a new attitude that rent will always be 30 percent of your net pay. I say that old units from mid 60s to be capped at an affordable rent until they are replaced, it is time to get rid of those, so, there needs to be an achievable strategic goal, if I may suggest also replace the same units that were bought my locals who have become homeowners, or least offer upgrade of those units through Housing Corporation. For a population of 35 thousand Nunavuimmiut that would probably 500 to 800 units to be replaced on top of population growth. This is achievable, come on Canada, give your ear and let us work on this – together.