MP Patrick Weiler has announced funding to build more homes faster in the District of Squamish. The Federal Government is giving the District $7 million to fast-track over 200 housing units in the next three years. According to a press release sent by MP Weiler’s office, this will lead to the construction of more than 1,300 homes over the next decade. The district is planning an affordable housing project on Government Road.
“Housing affordability has been a major concern for many people in Squamish and across the country, and we are very grateful for this significant grant we have been successful in securing,” said Mayor Armand Hurford. “This funding will help to ensure we can deliver more of the types of housing units that we need so that all residents have the opportunity to thrive in our growing community for many years to come.”
The Housing Accelerator Fund grant will fund an internal team dedicated to increasing the housing supply and reducing barriers to building various housing types in Squamish in line with the District’s Housing Action Plan. One of the Housing Action Plan’s first initiatives was to reform zoning rules for affordable housing and adopt blanket zoning bylaw changes to remove density restrictions and allow housing projects of six storeys or less in any Squamish neighbourhood (outside of higher flood hazard areas).
Development Cost Charges and development fees for all affordable housing developments will be waived, and municipally-owned lands suitable for affordable housing will be identified. Missing middle, affordable and rental housing applications will be expedited. The plan will also allow increased density and more homes along core transit networks by introducing zoning permissions for six units on single lots. The funding also includes $ 1 million to plan for infrastructure to accommodate the infill and future community amenities.
The HAF aims to fast-track at least 100,000 permitted new homes over the first three years, which cities and regions estimate will lead to the creation of almost 500,000 permitted new homes for people in towns, cities, and Indigenous communities across Canada over the next decade.
“Housing affordability has been a strategic priority of the District for the past decade and we recognize the great amount of work ahead of us, with very specific deadlines governed by the requirements of the CMHC grant,” Hurford said. “The District will be hiring multiple positions to drive this work forward, and we look forward to sharing much more information with the community over the coming months as this work progresses.”
Larry Murray says
Good to understand the action toward affordable housing. Perhaps a return to older values and approaches might also make sense. The Canadian Armed Forces, Forestry and Mining operations and other large scale projects valued having their work force close by so they built substantial barracks, camp bunk houses and even small company towns and villages (INCO’s Copper Cliff, Ontario)
Squamish has a work force consisting of emergency workers, fire, police, health and public works that should not be living in other communities and having to rush here in an emergency – or be hindered in doing so by a closed highway. Better to offer them affordable housing as first priority occupants here in town.
Ted Prior says
This is good . Thank the district staff and council for they were ready for this grant . Team work
Donald Raymond Patrick says
Providing affordable housing sounds good in the coffee shop … but if it is just to provide a roof over one’s head … what is it providing to the future local culture? The objective should be to meet the needs of family living. Every slum has high density and tight quarters with large families. Squamish is not at that level as yet … but things change as the kids leave the nest. I would suggest the size of the lot is the most important and should be the main focus, but seems density is the word … and it is not community family living when your kids are competing with parked cars for playgrounds and the entertainment of the day is listening to your neighbours thru the walls. Doing it on the cheap does not make for a future.
jay says
This is ridiculous. Open up the cheema lands already !!!!!
Francine Lessard says
I think most community got this grant weather they wanted it and are ready for it, needed and it was a given.
Now lets just see how they manage to use it and how efficient the results will be. Will they have to produce reports and consult with not only with us and our elected official or will it be contracts allocated and manage by the paid district staff.
Will says
This is great news, hopefully there will be adding new services (child care, schools and hospitals) for all the new people
Joshua says
There will continue to be a housing crisis in squamish, even with this grant funding the District will not be able to reach its goal of building 6840 homes by 2031 yet alone 9600 by 2036. DoS staff claim in their preamble to the housing needs report that squamish on average has approved 386 units per year. However, we all know that this is mostly due to larger projects being approved such as polygon, bosa,redridge etc. Now with the HAF funding squamish staff claim they will increase the approvals by 66 units per year totalling 452 units per year and 1300 homes in total over the next decade.
Well there still is a problem….a major problem. Based on the housing needs report squamish needs to approve and build 6840 units by 2031 to maintain CURRENT LEVELS of AFFORDABILITY. This report was completed in April 2023, so in reality squamish must approve 977 units per year between 2024 to 2031 to achieve that housing target. And lets be real that will never happen with the way things are going at District
Think about how the hell did squamish end up having a deficit of 6840 housing units? Smart growth has been gold standard for approving housing in squamish and yet has failed in every aspect to create affordable housing. The housing crisis in town is the direct result of nimby policies and this is why there is a major housing crisis in town where there is 0% rental vacancy and townhomes are now selling for $1M!
Lets also not forget that the housing needs report clearly states that there is a lack of zoned land for townhouses with garibaldi springs being the only land that is currently zoned to bring new supply of townhouses. Which basically means that the DoS has given Polygon an exclusive monopoly on setting the price for townhouses, they have zero competition in town. All the nimbys over the years that have blocked new development in town, also claim developers are greedy, now they should see the results of their efforts, they basically gave one developer a monopoly to set the price, at whatever price they want to sell their new homes. And they can do that because there is no other developer in town to compete with them.
It’s clear that the current path the DoS is going towards managing growth with nimby “smart growth” policies is not working, there needs to be a total rethink.