Local housing board fired in Fort Simpson, N.W.T.

The Northwest Territories Housing Corporation has dissolved the board that oversees Fort Simpson's local housing authority, fired the manager of the authority, and appointed a corporation employee to administer the authority.

It happened last week. The housing corporation says it was the result of the board and the manager's failure to address deficiencies identified in the most recent audit by the Office of the Auditor General of Canada.

Local housing authorities administer housing corporation programs, including collecting rents, handling evictions, maintaining public housing units and managing finances.

One of the former directors said the appointment of an administrator to take over for the Fort Simpson board shows that, to the corporation, the boards are no more than "window dressing."

"There's no difference between how the GNWT [Government of the Northwest Territories] handles it and any dictatorship in the Third World — 'If you don't do it the way I want it done, I will fire you,'" said Muaz Hassan.

Tom Williams, the president of the Northwest Territories Housing Corporation, says auditors found the board was running a deficit and that there were "governance problems" in the way housing programs were being administered in the village.

"I can't really get into the specifics, but there were obviously some irregularities in how administration was happening," Williams said. He said the irregularities included delays in contractor payments and procurement issues identified in the audit.

"The auditors raised it as a concern. The Office of the Auditor General is looking after the public purse and we take those concerns seriously," he said. "We gave an opportunity to the board to come up with a plan to fix it and what they provided was insufficient."

Audit not public

Williams said that, because the federal government provides the lion's share of funding for housing in the territory, the Office of the Auditor General of Canada audits each local housing authority annually. Those audits, unlike occasional reviews of government departments and agencies, are not released publicly.

Hassan said he believes the dissolution of the local housing board was the result of a personality conflict between a housing corporation official and the manager the board had hired.

Williams pointed out that there are local housing authorities across the N.W.T. and the corporation identified problems with only one. He said the last time the corporation took over administration of local housing was in Tulita a year and a half ago.

"The whole board was let go and the manager was let go. We had to rebuild the organization and now it's up and running. We have a local governance board in place, we have a new manager in place, and everything's running fine."

Williams said while local housing in Fort Simpson is being administered by the corporation, it will be business as usual for employees, contractors and those who rely on the corporation's programs.

The housing corporation runs 91 public housing units, 17 home ownership residences and 12 market housing units in the community of 1,200 people.