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NORTHERN NOTES: Everyone deserves a decent home

Editor's note:
Cece Hodgson McCauley first appeared in News/North 33 years ago. The column below appeared in the June 14, 1985 edition of News/North.

Housing and housing associations were created to give autonomy to communities but have created instead a perpetual problem. The idea was good to allow every citizen a chance to live in a decent home. But the associations have been criticized, damned and abused.

The problems will continue until we remove housing from the clutches of government. Maybe it works in the south, but here government has no business in business. We all know that.

The High Lords of Canadian Mortgage and Housing Corporation and the NWT Housing Corporation better start taking action on recommendations from the public, or be answerable for their inefficiencies.

Housing meetings are a useless exercise. There is no followup on recommendations. Turn housing over ot the private sector with government regulations and inspections.

Speaking from a native perspective, I think we should have been included in the planning stages. Our people are the ones who had to adjust to plumbing and electricity and had to learn not to throw anything down a toilet, overload a washing machine or dryer and to empty a vacuum cleaner.

The results were that we needed an army of plumbers and electricians to keep things in working condition.

Housing for natives should be turned over to native associations. They have proven they can build better and cheaper houses. They were successful in experimental housing programs in Good

Hope and Fort Resolution. They were efficiently done, with programs resulting in locally controlled home ownership.

The fundamentals of life, such as jobs, spiritual growth, social learning and education begin in the home. Before we dream of having our youth reach higher grades or goals, sober our people or train for jobs, we must solve the housing problem.

Our public housing in Inuvik is deplorable. Seeing is believing.

If our association goes into housing, I hope they follow Alberta's Enoch Band policy, which has three levels of housing. It all depends on the individual families, their ability to upkeep, show incentive. They move to a higher class home and if they show neglect, they move to a lower class home. Nothing like competition.

It is recognized, some people are unable to own or maintain a home for reasons of health, age or economics. Alternatives have to be provided. We have senior citizens' homes, but we have semi-senior citizens (people in their 50s) unable to find work and too young to be eligible for the homes. They end up living with families. Young families should have a break, not be forced to accommodate extra relatives.

Inuvik is losing on revenues, as many young people commute to and from Whitehorse to jobs in the Beaufort. The reason? No available housing.

We should encourage rooming houses. Young singles in the work force would welcome just a room to call their own, for privacy and storage for belongings while they go out to jobs.

This is where the government comes into the picture. It allows tenants to rent rooms if they wish. Many single people and couples with no children live in three and four bedroom homes.

Now, don't think I've lost my marbles. We need a third type of home, a hostel for derelicts. One such home was opened in Edmonton on 10502 98 St. and doing great – strict rules, no violence, drugs, booze and no sex?? Good gosh, by the time they come out, they could be saints.

Father Adam, bless his soul, used to put mattresses on the family hall floor for the derelicts in Inuvik.