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, Canada’s auditor general has found.
The Office of the Auditor General audited the territory’s housing agency over a period of two years beginning on April 1, 2023 and published its report on Tuesday.
Auditor general Karen Hogan made a series of recommendations to improve public housing and housing supports, all of which have been accepted by Housing NWT.
The agency, in turn, laid out a series of steps to address the recommendations over the next two years.
“Many of the issues raised in this audit are not new. They were identified in our previous audits, in 2008 and 2012, and remain unresolved,” said senior assistant auditor general Paule-Anny Pierre in a news release about the report.
Advertisement.
Advertisement.
In a separate news release published on Tuesday, housing minister Lucy Kuptana said Housing NWT is taking action on the auditor general’s recommendations.
“We must be realistic about what we can achieve with the resources available, but one thing is clear to me – we all share the same goal of more homes for northerners,” Kuptana stated, “and we will continue to strengthen our systems and improve access to safe, healthy housing for all northerners.”
Lack of monitoring
Hogan found Housing NWT did not sufficiently monitor local housing organizations’ use of a point-rating system used to allocate public housing units.
The system allocates points to applicants by taking into account factors such as suitability, affordability, amount of time on the waitlist, and family violence. Those with the most points should be allocated a public housing unit.
Advertisement.
Advertisement.
However, the audit found Housing NWT couldn’t have known if equitable access was being granted because it only monitored local housing organizations – which are responsible for administering most of the public housing in the territory – on an ad-hoc basis.
There was no consistent or documented process to ensure the system was being used appropriately, the report found.
Housing NWT accepted the auditor’s recommendation that it should monitor the use of the point-rating system by local housing organizations. It committed to conduct an external review of the structure and governance of local housing organizations, as well as its monitoring processes, by October 2027.
Ensuring homes are in good repair
Local housing organizations are meant to issue a rating of the condition of every public housing unit once every two years. Housing NWT is meant to check up on this by verifying the rating on three units for every local housing organization every two years.
But Housing NWT did not ensure local housing organizations issued ratings every two years and, during the time of the audit, it verified the ratings of only half of the local housing organizations, the report found.
The audit concluded that Housing NWT failed to compare new ratings with those from previous years, and failed to account for any major changes to ratings.
The verification of these ratings had also been an issue noted in the auditor general’s report in 2012.
The auditor recommended the agency document how it oversees ratings and the maintenance performed by local housing organizations, then follow up to ensure units remain in a state of good repair.
Advertisement.
Advertisement.
Housing NWT was also told it should assess local housing organizations’ compliance with required maintenance on an annual basis and enforce the existing requirements that local housing organizations submit quarterly reports on maintenance activities.
In its response, Housing NWT said wildfires and evacuations impacted the agency’s ability to carry out sufficient monitoring, though it has committed to addressing the recommendation and to finish modernizing its maintenance system.
It also committed to introducing third-party condition assessments in three communities by October 2027.
Equitable access to homeownership programs
During the audit period, Housing NWT ran several programs to support homeowners with things like emergency repairs, fuel tank replacements, preventative maintenance, home repair for seniors and more.
The auditor examined a sample of 51 applications from all homeownership programs and found that 22 percent didn’t meet the eligibility criteria due to missing documentation.
For the emergency repairs program, the audit also found that the repairs for the funded applications were not completed within the 60-day time frame required by Housing NWT.
Additionally, the report found that Housing NWT didn’t monitor the outcomes of the homeownership programs, which the auditor said would be required to ensure the programs were meeting the objective of equitable access to supports.
The auditor recommended that program eligibility be followed and staff have sufficient guidance on verifying documentation. It was also suggested that Housing NWT evaluate the performance of homeownership programs and their outcomes.
Housing NWT accepted these recommendations and noted it is exploring additional resources to allow for more file audits and monitoring.
Additionally, it noted an evaluation framework has been developed for its 2024-25 Emergency Repair Program and it will be examined in the next two years.