Northern Territories YWCA to get $1.5 million over the next three years

The YWCA will receive $1.5 million over the next three years from Status of Women Canada to develop programming geared towards women in all three territories.

The application was only approved in late December, there is no word yet on how that money will be broken down, according to Paulette Senior, CEO of YWCA Canada.

The new funding is for programming, rather than infrastructure, there is a real need for a women's homeless shelter in Nunavut and the Yukon, according to Senior.

That need was identified clearly in the recently released You Just Blink and It Can Happen: A Study of Women's Homelessness North of 60, she added.

"I think it was a wakeup call in terms of the federal government seeing how critical the situation is, and critical in terms of bringing the issues of homelessness and the dire situation of women in the North to the rest of the country," Senior said.

A co-ordinator for the program has already been hired, and will be in Iqaluit in February to meet with local women's organizations, according to Senior.