Auditor general ‘satisfied’ with Housing NWT’s commitments

Canada’s Office of the Auditor General said it is satisfied with commitments made by Housing NWT to address the office’s recommendations after it issued a damning report last fall.

In October, the auditor general released the findings of its audit, saying Housing NWT did not ensure residents most in need of shelter had equitable access to public housing and did not effectively ensure the state of repair of its units.

“The auditor general had six recommendations for Housing NWT in their report, and we accepted all of those recommendations, and we began to take immediate steps to strengthen oversight, improve maintenance activities and modernize policies to ensure fairness and transparency,” said Housing NWT president and CEO Erin Kelly in a public hearing last week.

One of the recommendations centred around a lack of oversight over local housing organizations and their use of a point-rating system to allocate units.

In the public hearing, Kelly said Housing NWT is conducting an external review of the structure and governance of local housing organizations and current monitoring processes.

The agency is also establishing a framework for monitoring the allocation practices of public housing units, creating a tenant transfer policy for those who request to be moved to a different unit, and updating the tenant relations manual issued to LHOs, Kelly said.

Taking questions about the monitoring of LHOs, Kelly said sometimes that work was happening in a more informal way.

“One of the lessons we learned is we had put a real focus on improving relationships with LHOs and developing the relationship piece, and sometimes it seems it was at the expense of documentation,” said Kelly.

“Many of the places where it says inadequate or ad-hoc monitoring are because there were conversations that were going on, but we weren’t documenting those properly.”

Answering a question from Sahtu MLA Danny McNeely about Housing NWT’s point-rating system for allocating public housing units, Kelly said the previous system had flaws.

In Behchokǫ̀, for example, she said people were having a hard time moving out of transitional housing and into social housing because the point system would mark them as housed, therefore in less pressing need of placement.

She said the point system has since been updated to more easily allow people to move through the housing continuum.

“Otherwise, what was happening is people were being stuck in transitional housing for years and years because they weren’t able to to move through,” said Kelly.

Capacity strengthening

Speaking to another recommendation, Kelly said Housing NWT is assessing LHO compliance with required maintenance activities on an annual basis and requiring the organizations to submit quarterly reports on maintenance activities.

Kelly said Housing NWT has modernized its maintenance management system since the report was published.

“To support more timely and accurate reporting on performance outcomes, Housing NWT is expanding the use of online reporting tools and we’re piloting digital devices,” said Kelly.

This spring, Kelly said, LHO staff in Yellowknife and Hay River will pilot the use of mobile devices to track work orders, with the goal of expanding the pilot to other regions.

Speaking to a recommendation related to ensuring equitable access to homeownership programs, Kelly said Housing NWT “has a clear understanding of the changes required to address the minor documentation issues that were raised.”

“We will conduct a thorough review of our documentation processes for the homeownership repair programs,” Kelly said.

“We are also exploring additional resources to strengthen our capacity for routine file audits and monitoring, providing added support and training for staff will help ensure that eligibility and prioritization criteria are applied consistently and fairly across all regions.”

‘We see concrete actions’

One of the auditor general’s recommendations was that Housing NWT evaluate the performance of homeownership programs and their outcomes.

Kelly said the agency is addressing this area of its work and has recently filled a new program evaluation position at Housing NWT.

“We’re working to embed a culture of evidence-based decision-making and continuous improvement across all of our homeownership programs,” Kelly said.

Many of the changes Housing NWT committed to making as part of the audit process are expected to be complete by October 2027.

Taking questions in the public hearing, senior assistant auditor general Paule-Anny Pierre said though some concerns in the most recent report had been raised in past audits, she was satisfied with the response from Housing NWT.

“This time around, we see that there are concrete actions that are measurable with a set timeline, so that’s the major difference from what we have seen in the past,” said Pierre.

Asked by Dehcho MLA Sheryl Yakeleya if the deadlines Housing NWT committed to are feasible, Kelly said there are capacity challenges within the agency but it is working toward the established timeline.

“We’re looking internally to see how we can be as effective and efficient as possible,” said Kelly.

“There are also capacity challenges within the LHOs, so we’re working hard to try to find ways to use the limited resources that we have to address these and meet our timelines that we put in the report.”