SOMBA K'E/YELLOWKNIFE - Anti-poverty activists put together a package – a "gift," complete with gift-wrapping – for members of the legislative assembly, which was then delivered to Frame Lake MLA Wendy Bisaro last Wednesday.

Frame Lake MLA Wendy Bisaro, left, accepts a "gift" of both national and territorial reports and data on poverty from Aggie Brockman, co-chair of Alternatives North, on Dec. 16 outside the legislative assembly. Alternatives North and 13 other social groups and organizations gave Bisaro the reports in an attempt to urge the government to take action on poverty in the NWT. - Tim Edwards/NNSL photo

The group, which included Mayor Gord Van Tighem, Dayle Handy from the Yellowknife Homelessness Coalition, and Lyda Fuller of the Yellowknife YWCA, were calling on the territorial government to develop anti-poverty strategy after marching over the legislative assembly from city hall.

"We have a number of reports, mostly from the NWT and some national, that really make the case," said Aggie Brockman, co-chair of Alternatives North.

"They provide all the facts, they provide the arguments for an anti-poverty strategy."

In the package were several reports and information booklets, including the Yellowknife Homelessness Report Card, Alternatives North's "'Poverty' A Whispered Word in the NWT," and "Falling Through the Cracks – A Single Mother's Personal Account of Accessing GNWT Social Programs" by Aimee L. Clark.

The reports included one in 2007 from the Yellowknife YWCA that concludes there are about 1,000 homeless women in the NWT, and another from the territorial government last year that reports 20 per cent of all households in the NWT have incomes below $30,000 a year.

There were 14 reports total included in the "gift."

The anti-poverty group waited around in -28 C temperatures for 10 minutes before Bisaro finally came out to greet them. Upon receiving the package, Bisaro said she intends to act on it.

"It certainly is something that I think we can work on," said Bisaro.

"It certainly fits in with our goals an objectives in a general sense, and I'm quite happy to take it forward to cabinet, and to the standing committee on social programs, of which I'm a member, and discuss it."

Bisaro said though the government states goals and objectives to do with healthy, educated families, and cost of living, she is "not aware of any strategy, policy, or framework that the government has relative to poverty, per se."

Bisaro also said poverty is an issue the federal government is not doing nearly enough to tackle.

Brockman added that a first step for the government will be to create a definition of poverty, which she says encompasses the homeless and those with income too low to pay all their expenses, such as regular meals or things like dental care.