Five concerned Vancouver residents say Little Mountain needs far more affordable housing
By David Chudnovsky, Kia Salomons, Barry Growe, Linda Shuto, and David Vaisbord
The revised proposal for a massive condo development at the former Little Mountain social-housing site is coming to city council soon. And we're beginning to hear that the new project is somehow more acceptable to the community than the many schemes that have been put forward over the last nine years. That's not our view.
For us it is impossible to support a redevelopment plan when it's the wrong project. There is so much that is wrong with what is slated to come to council.
1. First, the privatization of this huge piece of land is outrageous. There is absolutely no excuse for it. The minister responsible for homelessness, Rich Coleman, has claimed that somehow the revenue from the sale of the land at 35th Avenue and Main Street was required for other social housing projects to be built. That's clearly not the case, as Coleman himself admitted years ago when the sale looked like it might not go through. More to the point, why in the world would we sell off social housing land to build other social housing? If we needed new parks we wouldn't sell Queen Elizabeth Park and use the revenue to build new parks somewhere else. But when it comes to social housing there isn't the political will to invest, so valuable community assets, like the Little Mountain site, are sold.
2. The city's own policy requires a minimum of 20 percent affordable housing in new developments. Two hundred-and-thirty-four social housing units are proposed to replace the ones that were bulldozed in 2009 at Little Mountain.
Let’s do the arithmetic. If there are 1,500 additional units at the new Little Mountain, the 20 percent rule should generate 300 “affordable” homes. That’s a lot more than the 234. Together with the replacement units (1,500 + 234) the “affordable” suites should number at least 347—as many as 110 additional “affordable” apartments to comply with city requirements.
But even that calculation misses the point. The 234 replacement units (except for 10) are just that—replacements. There’s no justification for counting them as part of the 20 percent city requirement for affordability. The purpose of the city policy is to increase affordability. Replacing what was already there increases nothing.
If the developer were simply making an application for a market development of 1,500 units, it would have to make 300 of them “affordable”. So that’s what the developer should be required to do at Little Mountain. If the plan goes ahead as proposed then about 300 of the market units need to be “affordable”. And that means that at the new Little Mountain, 234 replacement social housing units plus 300 new “affordable” units—that’s 534—need to be provided.
Clearly the city is aware of this dramatic shortfall, so it has added 40-something additional units to the plan. When we asked at a city-sponsored consultation meeting exactly how many units it was talking about, the answer was vague—and it was clear that there is no guarantee that any of them will be built.
3. It’s important here that we remind ourselves that “affordable” has an actual meaning and it’s not the flexible one often used by City Council. It’s affordable if the rent is no more than 30 percent of family income at all income levels (CMHC definition). The new mayor of London is clear about this. Why doesn’t our city council understand?
4. The outcome of the action that the remaining tenants took in refusing to leave their homes included a number of promises by the province and city. First, the tenants were permitted to stay. Second, the first part of the commitment to social housing was fast-tracked—and they were given the right to move in. Third, the assurance was given that all of the replacement social housing would be built in the first phase of the development. That promise has now been broken. Again, when asked at the consultation meeting the Holborn representative was extremely vague as to just how many replacement units would have to wait until stage 5 of the redevelopment—which is slated to be at least 10 more years down the road.
5. The social amenities that are part of the plan don’t even begin to deal with the impact of so many new dwellings. To cite just one example, Hillcrest Community Centre is bursting at the seams. It is virtually impossible to schedule a community meeting in the building because all of the rooms are already used. The pool, rink, gym, and other facilities are all oversubscribed. In fact, Hillcrest is a destination centre for the whole of the city. The centre already cannot serve its own community adequately. What will happen when 1,500 new units are built on its doorstep?
The people working on the plan seem sincere. They have brought all kinds of interesting suggestions about saving trees, view corridors, and bicycle access. But the province and the city have set them to work on the wrong project. The last thing this city needs is hundreds and hundreds of new high-end condos. We do need more social housing, and more real affordable housing. And we need them in human-scale developments that are integrated into every neighbourhood in Vancouver.
We will continue to oppose this development plan. When we look at Little Mountain we see a successful community that was bulldozed, hundreds of tenants who were pushed out of their homes, decades of lost rent payments to B.C. Housing, and a huge vacant lot (now almost seven years old) that is a testament to the misplaced priorities of the provincial government and city council.
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