policy
06. policy With all levels of government having seemingly exhausted demand-side policies in their aim to restore some modicum of housing affordability, attention has now firmly turned towards the supply side of the equation. At the provincial level, British Columbia’s Housing Supply Act grants the province the authority to set housing targets in municipalities with a goal to get more development permits approved faster. Nationally, the federal government has announced it will remove GST from new purpose- built rental buildings and has now funded its first project using the previously-announced Housing Accelerator Fund. In the City of Vancouver, a policy to permit multiplex zoning on previously single-family-only zones is moving forward.
MAKING A LIST AND CHECKING IT TWICE
British Columbia’s Housing Supply Act grants the province the authority to set housing targets at the municipal level, starting with those they deem have the greatest need and highest projected growth. In May, they announced the first ten municipalities on their “naughty list”: Abbotsford, Delta, Kamloops, the District of North Vancouver, Oak Bay, Port Moody, Saanich, Vancouver, Victoria, and West Vancouver. In June, a more comprehensive list of 47 municipalities were specified in the order, to be included in the housing supply act, including the municipalities representing the majority of the population in Metro Vancouver, Capital Region, and the Central Okanagan.
The targets are intended to encourage municipalities to address their own barriers to developing new housing such as updating zoning bylaws and streamlining the development process so more homes can be built more quickly. Though any initiative that seeks to streamline development permitting processes and speed up the supply of new housing throughout the province is welcome news, specific targets have not yet been set, so the effectiveness of the policy remains to be seen. Stay tuned for more in this space in the next rennie landscape.
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