Council going slow on rental housing

Mayor acknowledges council’s reputation for moving too slowly on housing crisis

Vancouver city council’s differing views on rental housing were on display at a recent meeting: Five members felt council should be acting as quickly as possible to get more rental homes built, some thought we may need more but it wasn’t worth rushing and one questioned the need to boost rental construction at all.

Council was considering zoning amendments that would basically make it easier for developers to build six-storey, mixed-use developments along many commercial streets — two floors more than the four already allowed there — if the residential portion of the building is rental instead of market condos.

For many years, the vast majority of these developments along those arterials have been market condos, which are more profitable for developers. The changes coming to council for a decision last month were an attempt by the city to tilt the balance toward rentals, trying to improve Vancouver’s chronically low vacancy rate, which has for a decade hovered around, and sometimes below, one per cent, according to city statistics, well below the three to five per cent considered healthy.

But council didn’t approve, reject or modify the proposed changes. Instead, they voted, 6-5, to defer the decision to some point in the future pending further consultation.

There was a stark difference in the way some councillors described the situation at the July 24 meeting, which ran until 10 p.m. on a Friday as council worked through several days of packed agendas before their August break.

For NPA Coun. Colleen Hardwick, things were moving too fast. These changes shouldn’t be “rushed through,” she said.

On the other end of the spectrum, Mayor Kennedy Stewart said this council is gaining a reputation for moving too slowly to address what most of them have described as a housing crisis.

“I want to vote on this this evening, and I want to get on with building more rental housing in this city,” he said.

As Stewart pointed out, in the commercial zones council was looking at, developers can currently build four-storey condo projects without seeking a rezoning.

Stewart wants to push developers toward building more rentals, saying: “I cannot vote for more condos.”

Other councillors too insisted it was worth acting quickly. OneCity Coun. Christine Boyle, and NPA councillors Melissa De Genova, Lisa Dominato, and Sarah Kirby-Yung also opposed the delay.

Boyle said: “We know that we need more rental more than we need more condos ... these are changes we should make now, not postpone and delay.”

Hardwick said she just doesn’t believe it’s necessary to boost rental housing production at all.

Hardwick predicted the COVID-19 pandemic will reduce demand for rental homes, adding: “The buildings that will be built through these changes will not be completed for at least three or four years, which is well beyond the current moment and the formerly low vacancy rates to which proponents point to to justify the changes.”

Green Coun. Adriane Carr introduced a motion to refer back to staff for “further public consultation” through the fall, “including at the neighbourhood level.” The motion was seconded by Hardwick and supported by fellow Green councillors Pete Fry and Michael Wiebe, as well as COPE Coun. Jean Swanson and Independent Coun. Rebecca Bligh.

In November 2019, city staff reported to the current council on possible measures to shift toward that “right supply” of rentals over condos, and — as Dominato noted at last month’s meeting — there seemed to be broad agreement among most councillors at that time about this policy direction and the urgent need to add more rental housing.

According to the city’s summary of the community consultation conducted on these proposals since last November, the idea of six-storey rental developments along high streets seemed relatively uncontroversial. It was another proposed rental incentive that drew more concern during this year’s consultation: changes to allow four-storey rental buildings on residential side streets just off arterials. That idea, according to the city, “received more comments and questions” than the six-storey buildings on main streets. Consultation on the four-storey proposal is continuing until October through an online portal at shapeyourcity.ca, and council is expected to decide on that later this year.

The timeline for that decision, of course, could change. With this council, nothing is easy to predict.