Modular housing project will help get people off streets: Eby and Sim
Facing huge pressure to address social disorder and crime on the Downtown Eastside, B.C. Premier David Eby and Vancouver Mayor Ken Sim have announced 90 new modular homes they say will help people living in shelters and on the street.
B.C. Housing will build two new transitional housing projects with round-the-clock supports at 1500 Main St. and 2132 Ash St.
While neither of those is in the Downtown Eastside, the modular, work-camp style units will be offered to people living in shelters, which will free up shelter spaces for people living in encampments along Hastings Street and in CRAB Park.
“One look at CRAB Park and Hastings Street should tell everybody that more action, and in particular urgent action, is needed,” Eby said during a news conference on Main Street near the site of one of the new modular buildings.
“This is one of the ways that we can provide housing on an urgent basis.”
There are approximately 475 people living outside right now in various encampments in the city, Eby said. Both single-storey buildings will go through an accelerated development permitting approval process by the City of Vancouver and are scheduled to open in March.
The province will spend $6.9 million on the project and the City of Vancouver provided the land.
Karin Kirkpatrick, B.C. Liberal MLA for West Vancouver-Capilano, said the announcement raises more questions than answers.
She wants to know how people will be selected for the modular homes, will the buildings be men only or women only, what kind of wraparound supports will be provided on site and how long will people live in the modular units before getting permanent housing.
“You've got to make sure that there's a next step for people to move through (to permanent housing), otherwise you're just warehousing people,” she said.
The housing units will operate for at least three years, which Eby said will give people enough time to access better health supports and more permanent housing, which the province is rushing to build.
“That is certainly expected to be more than enough time for a number of permanent housing sites that we have in development across the region and certainly in the City of Vancouver to open up to provide permanent housing,” Eby said.
“We expect there will be a cycling through of people living on this site to then going into permanent housing units as they open.”
Eby acknowledged the two buildings are not going to be for everyone because some people want to be relatively close to the services in the Downtown Eastside while others want to be far away from that location.
Sim said the modular homes are “not a permanent solution,” but “will deliver much-needed housing to quickly bring up additional capacity at shelters around the city.”
City staff in August started a complex process to remove tents and encampments on Hastings Street, but many people complained they had nowhere else to go.
Thom Armstrong, CEO of the Co-operative Housing Federation of B.C., welcomed the announcement of more shelter for people living on the street, but wants to see the province kick in funding for permanent supportive housing.
Housing Minister Ravi Kahlon acknowledged the need for more permanent housing options and said the province is working on that.
Eby, who started his legal career with Pivot Legal Society representing low-income people on the Downtown Eastside, has promised that the province will take over management of the troubled Downtown Eastside which, he said, is “in the worst shape we've seen it.”
Eby spent the last week meeting with federal and municipal politicians, public safety officials, non-profit service providers, Chinatown business owners and Indigenous leaders to discuss the best way to address the deepening crisis in the neighbourhood.
Eby met with federal Mental Health and Addictions Minister Carolyn Bennett, Vancouver fire Chief Karen Fry, who has raised concerns about the fire hazards created by encampments, and police Chief Adam Palmer, who has raised the alarm about the increase in random violent attacks around the neighbourhood.