Get Smart: City prepares to take on the Smart Cities Challenge
The city is going to try to win $50 million to build affordable housing through a competition run by the federal government.
Infrastructure Canada, the federal department responsible for public infrastructure in the country, is running a new competition called the Smart Cities Challenge that awards prizes of up to $50 million to winning cities.
On Tuesday night at city hall, councillors will hear more about how Peterborough plans to apply to win.
The competition is open to all Canadian municipalities, a report to councillors from Mayor Diane Therrien explains.
Therrien writes that the idea is to present an innovative approach to a problem that has been perceived to be “unsolvable.” She proposes that Peterborough apply for money to build affordable and mixed-use housing downtown.
There are no details in the report about the type of housing the city might propose, under its application.
But Therrien plans to strike a steering committee, which she would chair; she also plans to include members from agencies such as the Downtown
Business Improvement Area.
If Peterborough is included on a shortlist of 20 municipalities, it will win $250,000 to develop a detailed plan.
The city has been plagued with skyrocketing rents for several years, at the same time as the vacancy rate has shrunk in to 1.5 per cent as of last year. When the Warming Room homeless shelter closed on July 1, an encampment of more than 40 tents was set up in Victoria Park and smaller tent cities also sprung up at city hall and at parks and church properties.
The encampment at Victoria Park was dismantled at the end of August, and many people went to camp elsewhere.
The last of those campers dispersed lately, but it wasn’t clear where they’d go: as the last of them left the property at St. John’s Anglican Church at the end of October, some said they would couch-surf.