CAREFUL ON SECONDARY SUITES
Council has long been split on issue, writes
City council is considering a major citywide land use amendment at its public hearing on Monday — the final chapter in secondary suite reform. It will be the culmination of an eight-year mission to make secondary suites available to all Calgarians.
Here are some important facts to keep in mind about secondary suite reform. The communities that will be considered by council are the more traditional suburban communities, or estate communities, that we often refer to as single-family home communities. The city estimates that this may be as many as half our home-owning community, or 170,000 properties.
I firmly agree that city council has to remove secondary suite land use applications from their monthly public hearing agenda. These applications have not been a good use of council’s time. The waiver of the application fees in 2013 was the likely nexus of this influx of items.
Since 2010, council has had a split view about secondary suites — with half wanting greater and more affordable housing options, and the other half echoing many residents’ views that the introduction of secondary suites will remove their particular suburban housing choice and lifestyle.
Why does council want all communities to have the option of secondary suites? The two answers council has pointed to repeatedly are housing affordability and public safety.
The occupant safety issue remains a legitimate concern. The land use designation is certainly an important first step, but if a landowner is not prepared to complete the development permit and building permit applications, and pay for the required alterations (which could be substantial), land use alone will not solve the safety issue. Only owner resolve will achieve this.
Will the delegation of decision-making to city staff for permitting solve any remaining community concerns about secondary suites?
My view, based on decades of planning appeal practice, is that there are likely very few substantive development permit conditions that will make secondary suite development permits objectionable.
Development permit appeals of approved suites will be challenging.
Objectors must find planning rationale against the approval, which might include things such as lack of on-site parking; loss of privacy to neighbours; locational characteristics; insufficient suite outdoor amenity space.
So, while permitting may not prevent a suite from being installed next door, something else might.
Neglected in past reports to city council is any detailed consideration of the impact of restrictive covenants on many traditional single-family, single-detached dwelling communities.
These communities may have been developed — in many cases by the city when it was in the housing business — with this singular, low-density vision. Covenants limit the use of land — most often limiting the housing density on a parcel to a single-family dwelling.
Past reports to council have dismissed covenants as a private law remedy that exists separately from the city’s processes.
While on the surface, this is true, should city council amend land use in covenant communities, it may, as a result, create an expectation that covenants no longer apply.
A short list of Calgary communities that still employ restrictive covenants include communities such as Bel-Aire, Britannia, Cambrian Heights, Mayfair, Mount Royal and Rutland Park. And countless more exist.
Covenants remain a valid planning tool today for multiple uses in new community development.
They were employed anew in Edmonton recently to prevent narrow lot infills from intruding into a more traditional community.
An unfortunate byproduct, is that council may be effectively asking these covenant communities to increase their war chests to fend off well-meaning owners who might think that covenants don’t apply in the face of any blanket land use amendment. That would be unfortunate for all parties, as the covenants will still apply and ignorance of them will likely lead to applications to the courts.
There is a real case to support urban densification — using tools such as secondary suites — where conditions warrant.
But proceeding with a blanket community wide redistricting, knowing that covenant communities exist, sets up communities and neighbourhoods for further conflict — this time before the courts, instead of city council.
I encourage council to apply some sober second thought prior to lumping covenant communities into the land use amendment hopper.
People who have not travelled to Africa might actually believe that what those TV advertisements portray is the day-to-day lives of all Africans. Onai Petra Paswani-Abote