A New Day steams ahead
Department of Justice says transition was smooth; friendship centre files complaint over how contract was awarded
Jessica Davey-Quantick
Northern News Services
Friday, July 21, 2017
SOMBA K'E/YELLOWKNIFE
Nearly a month after the John Howard Society was awarded the contract to operate A New Day, the Department of Justice says the program is running like clockwork.
"The transition has been smooth and with no interruption in service to clients," stated Marie-Eve Duperre, communications adviser with the department in an e-mail to Yellowknifer.
The NWT's only support program for men who have perpetrated violence against loved ones was previously offered through the Tree of Peace, under a contract that ended June 30.
The request for proposals to take over the program however, was loudly criticized by the public and MLAs, with many community members speaking out with concerns about changes to the program. On May 18, the RFP closed with no one offering to take it on.
On May 31, Justice Minister Louis Sebert announced in the legislative assembly the program would be handed over to the John Howard Society.
The contract, worth an estimated $575,000, according to department spokesperson Sue Glowach, also grew from the nine months originally offered in the RFP to a four-year gig.
That prompted the Tlicho Leagia Ts'iili Ko Rae-Edzo Friendship Centre to file an official complaint over how the program was handled.
"What I hope happens is that the minister puts this thing out for an open bidding process and that the best agency that comes up with the best plan is awarded the contract and is able to do the work in a way that is going to make a difference," said Joe Pintarics, executive director of the friendship centre.
He said his group would have bid the first time around if the contract awarded to the John Howard Society had been on the table.
"One of our very strong positions as a friendship centre is we're not going to do anything that causes harm," he said.
"I think the minister's massacring the program ... they're just going to render it totally useless."
Kyle Bird, executive director of the Northwest Territories/Nunavut Council of Friendship Centres says his group, which currently offers a program through their Yellowknife office for residential school survivors, would also have bid if it was a four-year contract.
"Hiring people with the capabilities to run the program for nine months is absurd," he said. "It's kind of just odd to look at - how would you hire somebody with the credentials on a nine-month program?"
The John Howard Society office, located downtown, is open Monday through Friday from 1 p.m. until 5 p.m.
Society executive director Robert Hawkins did not return phone calls to comment on how the program is currently running.
Neither the department nor the society would confirm which version of the program - what had previously been delivered by the Tree of Peace or the version offered in the rejected RFP - was currently being offered.
