Frances Bula header image 2

Affordable housing the latest project to get a SWAT team

February 12th, 2009 · 5 Comments

Remember the Vision Vancouver promise to create an affordable housing boom? Here comes the task force to accomplish same, as you can see in this motion coming up next week from councillors Geoff Meggs and Raymond Louie here.

It’ll be interesting to see what kinds of solutions they can come up with, given how dramatically the development industry has changed. When VV first touted this during the election campaign, the thinking was that the industry could be persuaded to incorporate some lower-cost rental or market apartments into their developments by giving them a little extra space to sell for their wildly profitable higher-end stuff.

Clearly that business model isn’t too operational these days. So now the trick is to figure out what the city could do that would persuade developers (and their lenders) to build low-cost units without the benefit of the luxury market as a piggy bank.

I hear the mayor is going to be giving the keynote speech to the Urban Development Institute next month. Wait to hear what he says then.

Categories: Uncategorized