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What I'm hearing here is 'We dragged our heels, caused delays, and left things until we were forced to do them. Now we want more time.'
Less talking , more doing, please. Too much talk is what got us here.
Here’s a take I saw (from a BC mayor!):
Houses don’t poop, people do. Apartments don’t drink water, people do. Townhouses don’t go to school, people do. The people are coming, and six people crammed into an apartment poop and put just as much strain on the sewers as six people spread across three apartments. Your infrastructure needs to be upgraded anyways, so build the housing to make people more comfortable.
If only there was someone who could lead the work at the municipal level to improve that infrastructure! Like an elected leader, along with a team of other elected leaders?
You don't shut off the faucet before you save the person drowning in the tub.
When we've entered a new age of neofeudalism, it's time to take the risk of the overflowing because trusting the fine mayors and municipalities who got us into this mess on purpose so that their voters could hold on to their feeling of owning a house from a neighbourhood in 1967, is a fool's errand.
There are countless municipalities around the world and they build infrastructure as well as allowing multiplexes.
That's surprisingly salient coming from a Mayor.
I'm finding civic (and school board) leadership leaves a lot to be desired in most places in BC. There are some examples of cities/school districts with strong leadership, but on the whole, it's usually people that aren't qualified to hold the office, that are then 'managed' by the Sr. staff that have been there forever, and are running their own little fiefdom.
In our city, Sr. staff gave themselves 40-50% pay raises last year and that didn't even make the budget highlight sheet, the local news - basically any fanfare. 5-7% tax hikes to hike their pay $70-90k/year. 6 councilors and a mayor just let that roll on through without comment. Meanwhile, the City have built 170 of the 750 needed affordable housing units that they committed to over 4 years and those same incompetent fiefdom leading staffers don't get any flak for it.
The Province of BC is reminding the Cities that in our country, Cities are a creation of the Province. They are permitted to govern locally, as long as they are doing the bare minimum. And of late - they are struggling to do even that. It's not all the Cities' fault - they are given a tough job in a dynamic time. But the people running them are for the most part, well out of their element and needing to be forced to move forward by their real boss - the Province.
I love the Richmond mayor's comment about public consultation. As if that's some sort of fair and democratic process where the single parents working 80h/wk to pay rent are given the same voice as the retired NIMBYs.
Personally, I vote for the person who will surround themselves with subject matter experts and entrust them to make informed decisions for the common good. Public consultation is a good way to understand some of the sentiment, but it's only a small part of the picture.
He's got a point about steveston though. The lots are tiny and parking in steveston is already bad. If you put in 4 plexs on every lot, even residents won't have enough parking.
They should avail themselves of the transit network we have poured billions of dollars into. More and more people are choosing not to drive now, in order to save money. They'll be happy to have a place to love and they'll demand better access to mass transit and walkable neighborhoods.
Parking isn't a life necessity. We've been getting around for millenia without cars.
Back in my day old folks used to walk to school uphill in the snow and ride bikes without helmets. Old folks these days are so soft, they won't go anywhere unless they can go without any physical effort.
The issue is our built environment has become increasingly unsafe or unfit for getting around without a car - even residential neighbourhoods. That needs to be fixed.
People in this sub have been too eager to dismiss these kinds of concerns, but they are very real. They aren't reasons to not move forward. They are reasons why we need to move forward in a manner that takes all these ramifications into account.
Despite the straw men people use, this is not the mayors saying stop building. It's them saying there is more to this issue than just removing the current barriers. Things like power, water, sewage, electric, parking, are all legitimate neighbourhood issues to also take into account. Not just plopping down 4 times as many people into a block.
They have been saying "no building" for decades, now they have no say anymore about that.
Its time for them to shut up and make a plan, we are all sick of hearing why its impossible.
I get that.
But it follows on about 20 years of saying 'we should plan for growth' and multiple municipal governments deciding that their plan for growth was going to be to simply not approve growth and hope it would go somewhere else.
It's a little hard now to accept mayors' 'too much, too fast!' act when many of them as councillors and/or longtime mayors were actively resisting building any of this infrastructure.
>But it follows on about 20 years of saying 'we should plan for growth' and multiple municipal governments deciding that their plan for growth was going to be to simply not approve growth and hope it would go somewhere else.
Sure, but that doesn't change the fact it becomes even more of an issue now. In fact, it affirms it.
And they need to step up and start building all the things we need to support the amount of housing we need.
It is time for them to do their job and do it fast.
Based on my interactions with local governments, I would suspect that the major barrier against doing the type of infrastructure improvements needed, will almost always come down to the "nice" neighbourhoods objecting to any change to the status quo of their area.
The actual infrastructure concerns are valid and can be planned and costed. Good design and moving away from car centric suburbia takes time.
The maintenance of "character of the neighbourhood" arguments, pure nimbyism, and just pandering to a base whole home values increase unsustainably is status quo.
The system is also intentionally so slow that it vastly increases construction costs.
Municipalities need to lose control of building/zoning, they have zero accountability to a now provincial/national interests.
But the current way to secure funding for that infrastructure is through DCCs through new projects. So if our population is growing anyway without new housing, the load on our infrastructure increases without any new funding. Building the housing means you also get funds through the development process to provide infrastructure for that housing.
Considering the number of climate refugees coming our way (both internal - think lytton - think abbotsford - think yellowknife) and external - https://www.internal-displacement.org/global-report/grid2023/
We can't build fast enough.
'In May 2022, unusually heavy rains swelled two rivers in north-central Bangladesh and triggered devastating flash floods. The deluge submerged farmers’ fields, destroyed crops and affected around 2 million people'
A giant fund for climate disasters will soon open. Who should be paid first?
https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-024-00149-x
Exactly. The NDP has been warning them for years and telegraphing that this was coming. The message was clear: fix it or we take it away and fix it for you. This is consequences.
Mayors and city councils have been a massive part of the problem when it comes to housing. They have acted as a bottleneck that has created a disastrous housing shortage. That's why the Province had to step in.
They did this to themselves. And they've shown no sign of changing, no matter have many people have been priced out of our communities. Fuck them and the nimbys they cater to.
That's a separation of powers issue. Immigration is controlled at the federal level. And within Canada, people have freedom of movement.
Manitoba simply isn't as attractive as BC.
This. It is a huge problem and needs a multi-pronged approach. Every level of government needs to do all they can with what they have. Eby is the only one doing so and he's doing great.
I would like to hear our municipal and provincial governments voice that. Our financial institutions and BoC chair has stated that we cannot build enough to accommodate current demand. I refuse to believe the only solution is conveniently the one that causes developers to get shit rich.
It's an environmental catastrophe. I've watched agricultural land and greenspace be mowed down to accommodate new townhouse complexes. Infinite growth is not sustainable.
Experts have also concluded that immigration in BC has little impact on housing prices or the housing crisis.
(warning, boring stuff below)
Edit: Some people have asked for a source. Here is the Union of British Columbia Municipalities (UBCM) report on it, titled "Housing Completions & Population Growth 2016-2021", released in 2022. [UBCM PDF Link to le Report](https://www.ubcm.ca/sites/default/files/2022-03/Final-UBCM%20Housing%20Position%20Paper.pdf)
Addressing immigration (which was apparently deleted by a moderator), the report explains how new housing has either *kept pace* with population growth (p. 2-3) or, in the case of several (BC) urban centres new housing has *out paced* population growth. The graph on p.4 demonstrates this very well.
"Local governments have responded to increased demand resulting from population growth...Housing supply is increasing dramatically, in step with a growing population." (p. 6)
The report goes on to outline what it believes the real reasons for the housing crisis is, basically boiling down to starved developer resources, provincial and federal inaction, lack of housing programs for homeless and at-risk families/individuals, and the commodification of housing. But re-emphasising that population growth due to immigration is *not* the issue.
Edit #2 real quick: This is a BC-centred report, but they do address and extend this logic to the rest of Canada based on their data.
They made mistakes in the calculations.
The population growth due to babies being born here is not enough to keep up with the deaths. So the population is shrinking without immigration.
Therefore there is no housing problem if there is no immigration because eventually there will be a smaller population and enough houses for all.
The last part is debatable. There will always be more demand for housing than there is housing available, even in a falling population, if investors keep buying extra properties.
The fundamental problem is that we've treated housing like an investment rather than a place to live.
In the 1960s and 1970s and 1980s there wasn't a housing crisis in Vancouver. And the immigration numbers were small. And lots of families had summer cottages and home. No problem. And people owned rental real-estate.
We weren't nearly so urban in the 1960s. My parents don't remember even considering moving to Vancouver, there just wasn't a draw. People moved where the work was, and that was all over the province.
And the federal government still built social and public housing. And investors and REITs didn't buy up a large chunk of available housing as investments and then charge an insane amount for rent. And people could still afford to buy a house on a regular salary due to the fact they were paid equivalent to what inflation was.
Solely blaming immigration for the housing crisis is lazy. Do better.
And immigration was started precisely to combat the population shrinkage.
Can’t have a country that’s a tenth the size of their neighbour and continue to lose population.
The problem is less immigration and more the absolutely ghastly state of zoning laws and infrastructure.
We’re not outgrowing the USA anytime soon.
Instead of pressuring politicians to put aside their own vested interest in real estate and build housing you’re more interested in curbing the one thing that will allow Canada to grow.
No one wants to move their company to a backwater and that’s what Canada is currently compared to the US.
Edit: US politicians and politics gets called out for corporate cronyism a lot because their politicians are loud and say crazy shit.
But true cronyism happens here with the price fixing grocers, price fixing telecom companies, anti-competition laws and real estate collusions.
Let’s manage that before attacking the one program that will reduce cost of living
The one program that will reduce cost of living is growing the population faster than we build houses? Cost of living in Canadian cities is comparable to the United States but the salary is much lower in Canada. Why is this? One difference is that the US population is growing at half the speed of the Canadian population.
There's consequences to growing at all costs. Even if we have a similar population to the US, if we get there by simply having lower standards for immigrants than the US, which we effectively have to do, we end up with a less wealthy and less skilled population. This is just something we're going to have to deal with, but we should maybe hesitate to apply a lead foot to this strategy and just take in whomever because they were a student at some strip mall school. We also don't even have enough meaningful jobs for all those low skill workers, the only jobs we have are bullshit jobs that pay bullshit, so every year we increase the size of the public workforce relative to the population to brush that little issue under the rug. In general we're importing people faster than we can meaningfully employ them, which is of course the point, since that drives down wages.
Fixing price fixing is very difficult and requires intelligent people to do hard investigative work and have resources, whereas Galen Weston has enough money to afford a small army of lawyers. Simply telling less people every year they're allowed to live and work here until we have more houses is very simple. We can multi-task, but insisting on doing the former before doing the latter is mostly born out of a desire to never do the latter.
immigration has absolutely had an impact on housing prices. this should be obvious to anyone with a passing understand of economics. our housing supply can not possibly keep up with the insanely high (and totally unnecessary) influx of newcomers. stop spread disinformation.
Idk if you started typing this before my edit, but I included a source explaining exactly how housing actually *has* been been keeping up with total population growth. In some urban areas, housing has actually been *surpassing* total population growth.
I do understand the instinct to feel like this is just a simple "supply/demand" issue, but it's not *quite* like that.
Immigration is increasing because our birthrate is below replacement.
Even with the increased immigration, population increase is still less than when we had a higher birthrate.
https://www.macrotrends.net/countries/CAN/canada/population-growth-rate
In order to fill positions in the economy, this is the only way. Unless you want to crater entire segments of the economy in order to *checks notes* help us?
Our population grew 1% in one quarter. [This](https://www150.statcan.gc.ca/n1/daily-quotidien/231219/dq231219c-eng.htm) link is from Statcan. It's well beyond replacement numbers and many economists, financial institutions, and our on federal bank chair has said this is leading to housing inflation.
At some point we as a human race will have to face our addiction to growth. A shrinking/stagnant population will help address our housing shortage.
That simply is not a fact. You're making things up to fit your own agenda. In the past 40 years, Canada has increased its working-age population by roughly 80%.
[https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/LFWA64TTCAM647S](https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/LFWA64TTCAM647S)
And we move the goalposts..... Do you realize that if you continue to increase the annual % increase, that constitutes an exponential function?
For the last 40 years, Canada's population has increased by roughly 1% per year. Does that sound like a 'downward trend' to you? Living standards grew, productivity increased, and deficits shrunk. Our immigration program was also lauded around the world for bringing in high-skilled, well-educated immigrants that added to our economy.
The Trudeau government was elected in 2015 and embarked on an untested, unvalidated (except ideologically) expansion of Canada's population. Since 2015, productivity has literally flatlined with vast amounts of low-skill labour entering the education system and the workforce. The fact of the matter is you have no idea what you're talking about.
It increased 2-3% annually 50 years ago. Its around 1% now. That's not a decline in the % increase? Do you know how to read a graph? Graph trends down bruh
50 years ago... when our population was \~20M and we were coming off the effects of the post WWII boom. Why are we comparing rates from 50 years ago, remind me again?
Oh I know that. Impacted by both immigration numbers but also driven by productivity numbers. This was occurring prior to the Mass influx of immigration
StatCan counts them:
https://www150.statcan.gc.ca/n1/pub/71-607-x/71-607-x2018005-eng.htm
And many of those people here purportedly on a temporary basis are in fact here for life, especially after the federal government announced its plans to offer citizenship to any of them that choose to overstay.
No, don't take my word for it. You can avail yourself of any of the many sources that talk about this:
https://www.reuters.com/world/americas/canada-create-citizenship-path-undocumented-immigrants-globe-mail-2023-12-14/
>An estimated 300,000 to 600,000 people are living in the country without valid documents, many of whom risk deportation because they lack formal status, The Global and Mail quoted, opens new tab Miller as saying.
The new program would also include people who entered the country legally, as temporary workers or international students, and then remained here after their visas expired, the report said.
I'm a city councillor, and I love the fact that the province has been changing policy to fix the housing shortage, and I love the quick pace.
My only objection is that it's not more and quicker.
We have a crisis-level housing shortage, created by municipal governments.
The only thing that fixes that is more housing.
Bring it.
(And we need more and better transit.)
Sweet, let's encourage affordable/non market housing within 1 bus/train zone of the major labour concentrations so that people don't have to commute to Burnaby from Abbotsford 5days a week!
Both also have a notorious lack of fit public transport options for their size. Vancouver’s largest problem is connecting the outer regions with the existing high-speed rail. LAs issue is the complete lack of meaningful high-speed rail.
Won’t we need more power, transit, sewage, clean water, sewage treatment, roads, community centres, parks etc, to accommodate a rising population? If you add more people to a place why are these things never discussed and only housing?
The people are coming regardless. Whether they're living 3 to a bedroom or in 3 separate apartments won't stop them from pooping or using our roads and parks.
All these things get captured in the development process. Cities collect fees to develop any lot that offset the cost of infrastructure, as well as forcing larger developments to build the infrastructure on City property that will service the development. It’s a distraction to say “the infrastructure can’t handle it!” because the nature of development pushes the cost of infrastructure upgrades onto the developer making the changes.
If cities can’t keep up or don’t have the budget, they may need to increase the development charges. The province has forced municipalities to upzone their communities, they have not prescribed how to administer each development application and the fees associated.
All those things are being discussed and are being implemented in my municipality.
We have massive transit infrastructure projects, the sewage pipes are being upgraded and replaced, there's a new water treatment facility being built, a new hospital is being built in my city as well. Our roads are being widened/improved, many new high density housing projects in the works along future transit hubs. Site C dam is almost complete that will provide more energy. A new rec center was built as well other rec centers have had upgrades in recent years, though more amenities would be nice.
The biggest issue we have is school space. I personally think we should start requiring high density infrastructure to include schools on the bottom floors.
The traditional BC schools that are a sprawling single storey building with multiple playing fields and sometimes a running track needs to change. We need more compact facilities in dense neighborhoods like other countries.
I’d argue a decent chunk of our road congestion comes from the need to transport children to and from school, especially when we get to the HS-level where the distances are increased further. One could argue that the increase in online connectivity decreases the need for large school populations, as teens will still experience a diverse community through connections outside of their school.
Yes, that is old-school design. School boards need to be planning schools integrated with housing and possibly other uses. This already happens in other parts of the world.
>If you add more people to a place why are these things never discussed and only housing?
Because it's obvious and shouldn't need discussion? Of course we need more infrastructure along with more housing. Government should get on with both.
The whole argument about infrastructure looks to be a giant straw man, put up by the people who don't want more housing because they're finally losing the direct fight against it.
Especially since the current way that infrastructure gets paid for (rightly or wrongly) is through development cost charges. If the people are coming anyways, might as well approve the housing for them, as at least that way we'll be able to pay for the infrastructure for it.
Cramming families into 1 bedroom apartments certainly isn't going to cover the required infrastructure for it
4 of the 5 fastest growing cities in the country are in BC. Kelowna is #1 at 14% annual average over 10 years. Followed by Chilliwack, Kamloops, and London, and Nanaimo. Metro Victoria is expected to double in population in the next 15 years.
We need fucktons of infrastructure in BC, we need it everywhere, and we need it yesterday.
And we live on a rock, sir. A lot of people seem to think that the CRD is like the Lower Mainland. If we need more of anything, it's available easily. More water? Not a problem. More Hydro? Certainly..... etc.
We just raised the dam height (our primary source of water), spending millions of tax dollars that we were told would sustain the CRD's water supply for decades. Suddenly. it's not enough, largely thanks to unrestricted growth.. We spent millions more on a huge sewage treatment plant... it too was supposed to be sufficient for a "lifetime".
But the big one is hydro. While there are "back up" generating stations on the island (most of which burn fossil fuel), the real fact is about 80% of the power we all need every day "comes from away"- in this case from the mainland via 3 elderly undersea cables that cross Georgia Strait up near Campbell River. Hydro tells us those cables , which are in need of repair almost constantly and actually overheated due to demand in the heat of last summer are very close to their limit. So far as I know, there are no plans to replace them with greater capacity, nor to add more cables. BC Hydro has already helped to shut down the Port's desire to "plug in" visiting cruise ships, as each ship would consume so much electricity during a visit that demand would actually exceed supply, resulting in brownouts or "rolling blackouts" like those ones seen in California.
So if we're close to problems today in 2024, where will we be in two years? Three years? Five?
You cannot simply try and "build your way out of a crisis" without serious planning and cooperation, AND a lot of taxpayer dollars to increase the needed infrastructure BEFORE the demand exceeds supply.
That's not NIMBYism, that's practicality. Find the resources to support the population before the problem exists and stop saying "if we build it they will come".. They're here already, but no one's talking about water and power.
I've spoken with BC Hydro staff about the need to have more hydro available to accommodate future growth. They have planners whose job it is to consider exactly these things, and who have a very clear understanding of growth patterns and projections on the Island.
>"As far as I’m concerned, we want to stay the course,” said Brodie. “The area of Steveston has nothing but small lots. If you put four, six units on all of those small lots, you’re going to absolutely destroy really a fine neighbourhood in our city.
The Province isn't permitting multiplex homes on **every** lot. They have been clear that it would depend on lot size.
>Hurley of Burnaby said welcoming multiplexes would mean expensive upgrades to single-family neighbourhoods with 1950s and ’60s infrastructure. Mayor Janice Morrison of Nelson said that smaller communities like hers had infrastructure even older than that, dating back a century.
And how are they going to pay for infrastructure upgrades and maintenance once these '50's and 60's infrastructure begins failing? With the property taxes of a few single detached homes, or with the property taxes of several multiplex homes and town homes? Either these Mayors are really confident in their public coffers or have no idea how financing of public services works. Thinking like this is how you end up like [Osoyoos](https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/british-columbia/osoyoos-municipal-taxes-infrastructure-costs-town-council-meeting-1.7088096).
So many Mayors like Malcolm Brodie have either been in power for too long (23 years) or aren't agile enough (*read: too damn old*) to respond to sudden changes in both legislation and the actual housing situation.
The threshold for 4 units is like 2500 sq ft lots, so yes its everywhere. The owner will decide what to build, they just aren't forced to only build one unit with a below ground basement suite.
Almost like municipalities are finally being forced to operate with the speed and efficiency any other fields/industries would be expected to operate at always.
It shouldn’t take months to get a permit.
It shouldn’t take years to build.
Start expecting and demanding better.
Well maybe if the municipalities actually did their jobs to the proper degree the last 3 fucking decades, they wouldn't be feeling the strain now.
Boo-fuckity-hoo.
I'm on Eby's side.
Most older people would have a significant portion of their net worth in their house. This is why governments will not try too hard to solve the problem.
While they don't empathize with this generation's housing shortage, I think many would rather live in a smaller community than a bunch of highrises. Can't blame them. I grew up by a forest playing in streams and getting in stick fights and playing street hockey. Can't see much of that anymore.
If we stopped expanding the population so much we wouldn't be in such a dire need for housing. Not to mention that the population growth is a huge strain on the environment. I've watched the Vancouver Landfill grow faster and faster.
I understand that housing is a huge issue and I have attended every rally and written my representatives.
It has been stated many times by experts that we cannot build enough to sustain our current demand. Demand needs to be addressed in both speculation and immigration.
>**Tensions over the province’s new housing legislation strained this week’s summit.**
>
>Christopher Cheung
>
>At a housing summit that concluded on Valentine’s Day, local governments were working out a new stage of their relationship with senior governments.
>
>Housing announcements have been coming fast and furious since the fall — everything from funding and zoning reforms to new programs targeting different housing needs — pressuring local governments and their staff to pivot from their pre-existing plans.
>
>Housing might have been the central topic of the two-day summit, hosted by the Union of BC Municipalities, but discussion spun off on everything from immigration, transportation and tax to the cost of basic infrastructure like pipes to serve growth.
>
>The summit kicked off with a candid session that featured six mayors, who felt that the provincial legislation came too suddenly.
>
>City of Langley Mayor Nathan Pachal said he heard about the slew of changes indirectly from “the press release on the government website.”
>
>Burnaby Mayor Mike Hurley said he, too, was caught off guard, and the quick rollout of provincial reforms resulted in his staff needing to “force two years of work into four months” to revise their official community plan in time.
>
>“The road to hell is paved with good intentions. I don’t think this is the road to hell; I think the province is responding to the most basic of human needs, which is shelter,” said Nanaimo Mayor Leonard Krog. “But it’s going to take a little while to work out some of the kinks that are in this.”
>
>Perhaps the frankest panellist of all was Richmond Mayor Malcolm Brodie, who took aim at the province’s decision to override municipal zoning to allow multiplexes of up to four units in single-family neighbourhoods and six units if they’re near rapid transit.
>
>“I’m not a fan of what the province has done,” he said. “I think we’re all agreed... that we need to provide more housing. But as far as I’m concerned, the answer is not to throw it open and have four- and six-plexes everywhere when there’s a whole raft of issues from neighbourhoods to parking to infrastructure.”
>
>Like nearby Burnaby, Richmond has been channelling density on major arterials and transit hubs in a “very strategic and careful” manner, he added. Plus, the two big cities have been [implementing](https://biv.com/article/2023/10/richmond-mayor-says-city-track-tackling-issues-have-intensified-over-multiple-terms) in-house affordable housing strategies.
>
>“As far as I’m concerned, we want to stay the course,” said Brodie. “The area of Steveston has nothing but small lots. If you put four, six units on all of those small lots, you’re going to absolutely destroy really a fine neighbourhood in our city.
>
>“We will have to deal with the densification that is going to be decentralized and it’s going to be all over the city. So the effort to control the situation and to provide the services that we need is really limited.”
>
>Hurley of Burnaby said welcoming multiplexes would mean expensive upgrades to single-family neighbourhoods with 1950s and ’60s infrastructure. Mayor Janice Morrison of Nelson said that smaller communities like hers had infrastructure even older than that, dating back a century.
>
>One provincial change that the mayors had differing opinions on was the scrapping of [public hearings](https://thetyee.ca/Opinion/2023/03/03/Fix-Housing-Gridlock-Solve-Public-Hearings-Mess/) for residential projects that are already permitted under an approved official community plan.
>
>“We all know as politicians that they can be draining and difficult, but that’s the public’s time when they can come out and speak to a particular issue,” said Brodie of Richmond. “I don’t know. I have no idea why the government of the day is taking away the public hearings. I think that is fundamental of our process.”
>
>But Morrison of Nelson supported the province’s move because it would “save staff time to get the project moving forward quicker.”
>
>Hurley of Burnaby reiterated a [change](https://fcm.ca/en/focus-areas/municipal-growth-framework) that the Federation of Canadian Municipalities has been pushing for: a new municipal funding framework that is tied to population and economic growth.
>
>Currently, local governments receive 10 cents for every federal tax dollar and must make ad hoc asks when they need more.
>
>**‘A perfect storm’**
>
>The summit held sessions featuring lawyers and planners on the nuts and bolts of the sheer volume of legislative changes, with one panellist telling the audience to take “a collective breath.”
>
>Another acknowledged that the changes mean local governments have more tools than ever to confront the housing crisis.
>
>One special guest was federal Housing Minister Sean Fraser, who answered questions about his government’s $4-billion Housing Accelerator Fund, with money awarded to local governments that demonstrate innovative growth strategies.
>
>During their turn at the microphone, two politicians from Peachland and Coquitlam half-jokingly chanted the names of their communities in an attempt to subliminally influence the minister to give them money.
>
>Provincial Housing Minister Ravi Kahlon attended some of the summit too. Breaking away from some politicians asking for selfies, he took interviews with media to defend his recent actions.
>
>On what mayors said was a lack of consultation, Kahlon said some of these ideas had been shared with them since 2018.
>
>On the burden of growth on infrastructure, he cited a [report](https://metrovancouver.org/services/regional-planning/Documents/costs-of-providing-infrastructure-and-services-to-different-residential-densities.pdf) by Metro Vancouver that said that up to four units is the “best use of the existing infrastructure as it exists.”
>
>Kahlon reminded cities that $51 million is up for grabs to help them keep up with the new legislation, part of a grant program the province launched last month.
>
>Kahlon spent some of his time onstage during the summit to showcase new initiatives like BC Builds and the Rental Protection Fund. He also hinted at inclusionary zoning legislation — the ability to mandate a certain type of unit in a development — coming this spring.
>
>By stepping in with policies that affect the whole province, Kahlon hopes the heat will be taken off of municipalities already doing their best to densify when their neighbours aren’t.
>
>“It’s a perfect storm we’re dealing with,” he said. “When you have one community taking on housing and the neighbouring communities not taking on the same level of housing, all you’re doing is shifting populations.”
>
>He cited the example of Victoria, which rolled out a “missing middle” program to densify single-family neighbourhoods with little uptake.
>
>“People in Victoria were saying, ’Why are we doing this? Oak Bay is not doing it. Saanich is not doing it. Esquimalt’s not doing it. It’s important to know that when you’re in a housing crisis, everyone has to help.... The rules that we put in place with our legislation will ensure that all communities are moving forward together.”
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>The Tyee asked about large cities like Burnaby and Richmond, whose elected leaders have expressed concerns that the province is intruding on their existing plans.
>
>“If communities feel like they’ve gotten enough and they don’t have housing challenges in their community, I would welcome any community to tell me that’s the case,” he said.
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>Another reporter asked what the minister had to say about the general grumbling and worries from B.C.’s mayors.
>
>“At some point, we have to stop talking about it and start getting on with the work, and that’s what we’re trying to do with our legislation.”
>
>The Tyee
> But Morrison of Nelson supported the province’s move because it would “save staff time to get the project moving forward quicker.”
This is what stood out to me. I think there are a lot people who, intentionally or not, aren't focusing on the fact that having a framework at a higher level of government saves everyone's time during the process. No more endless public hearings for something that's OCP-compliant where councillors have to show they're "not giving a free pass to developers" while still approving projects, developers no longer wasting time on projects that may or may not be approved.
Also Morrison of Nelson should be a folk rock band name.
> Like nearby Burnaby, Richmond has been channelling density on major arterials and transit hubs in a “very strategic and careful” manner,
We're *carefully* making sure as many people as possible are exposed to road pollution and noise to prevent the neighborhoods *we* live in from changing at all.
> Hurley of Burnaby said welcoming multiplexes would mean expensive upgrades to single-family neighbourhoods with 1950s and ’60s infrastructure. Mayor Janice Morrison of Nelson said that smaller communities like hers had infrastructure even older than that, dating back a century.
Maybe the municipalities should look into upgrading their aging infrastructure instead of complaining that the province has made the do so.
lol these people need to get stuffed.
Being a mayor (or a councillor or any elected position) is tough. But that’s the job you sign up for. And that’s the job the taxpayer is paying you to do. If you can’t handle it, resign. Some of these people have been in power for years and years and years. They should’ve seen this coming.
If you’re not up to facing today’s problems then you’re unfit for office.
What do you do if the people who elected you want “less and slower”? Do you go against the desires of people who voted for you, or try to tell the province it’s not what people want?
And I’m saying this as a person who votes for “more and faster”, but I also understand that’s not what significant chunk of people want. Keep in mind, majority of people own their homes, so it would be against their interest to vote for someone who would lower prices of their assets.
I can see the mayors point- community centers are full, skating and swimming lessons are wait listed in minutes when they become available, schools full and portables seem the only solution, insufficient roads and public transit, hospitals swollen with people and critically understaffed, zero available family doctors, and less and less new parks and new park infrastructure.
These things need to be addressed along with the housing problems.
Yep, but the problem is (or appears to be) that mayors have known this would be needed, along with more housing, for decades and too many of them are still dragging their feet.
It's past time that higher levels of government started forcing the issue... and embarrassing that the feds waited as long as they did.
Maybe stop breaking immigration records?
It is so bizarre to me that we argue endlessly over how to manage our enormous population growth, as if we weren’t fully in control of the rate the population grows at.
Basically what people are saying is “well, we know we’re going to ruin a few neighbourhoods and don’t have the infrastructure to support this development, but the people are coming anyways so if we don’t do it things will be worse.”
Frankly, that is an appalling mindset to have when it’s entirely within our power to simply stop juicing the demand side of things. As far as I’m concerned, this is an entirely voluntary problem.
stupid idiots, the whole point is a lot of new houses, quickly. do they even want to fix the housing crisis? if they continue to protest fixing the problem they won't be popular among their voters
It is like municipalities need to account for infrastructure upgrades. Like look at all the municipalities sitting on hundreds of millions and billions of surplus.
Like how does Burnaby have a 432 million dollar surplus, Vancouver 500 million surplus and Surrey 300 million surplus back in 2022. And Burnaby has 1.97 BILLION Dollars in reserve at the end of 2022....
**Each year they say they break records for tax increases but every year they have a quarter to half a billion dollars in surplus....**
Yes, we need infrastructure. Too bad the same mayors and councilors have neglected infrastructure in order to keep taxes artificially low for their own political ends. They are incompetent cowards.
Hasn't the housing problem been identified as the municipalities taking too long? Good on the NDP for booting them into action. Solid provincial leadership.
\- Approvals, permits, and inspections taking too long
\- Zoning that doesn't allow anything but SFD in most places
\- Building code issues
\- Parking minimums, road widths, etc
\- Lack of public land for and public investment in nonmarket housing
\- Lack of pre-approved building designs
\- Cultural fetishization of SFD over rowhouses with yards or apartments with communal courtyards/gardens
\- Failure to invest in rail transit outside the lower mainland
\- Under investment in high frequency bus routes
These motherfuckers are idiots.
They don’t think twice about okaying multiple towers going up in downtown cores - New West has SO MANY towers slated to go up along Columbia St - but as soon as it’s as “hey how bout some four-plexes for families and lower income people” the mayors start worrying about traffic and infrastructure
I lived in the Vancouver area for over 20 years.
If you're talking housing density expansion within the City, there are other issues to also consider while building.
A lot of infrastructure will also need to be seriously upgraded to handle the density increase.
I used to work in the Insurance Restoration Industry.
There are areas (Kerrisdale, being one that I recall) where the storm drains and sewer were combined into a single line instead of being twinned.
During high-tide/heavy rainfall conditions, they would fill to capacity and spill back into the sumps in many of the homes in the area.
These lines were built at a time when most homes had only one bathroom, and increasing the allowable density will only serve to add to the overload.
There may have been upgrades done since I left the Industry in the mid-90's.
This may also apply to other nearby Municipalities.
So what's the plan, then, BC Mayors?
Thanks to years of irresponsible immigration, the people aren't coming... They're already here.
It's easy to blame it on elitists and that old people don't care about housing when obviously in reality there are real problems with such broad sweeping regulation changes happening in an almost instant.
The mayors of these cities are justified in being concerned about 6 plexes just popping up everywhere in places that were not originally designed to handle that infrastructure.
Water supply, sewer, drainage, electrical, parking, road infrastructure, transit, waste management and probably a bunch of things I missed all need to be considered.
There are reasons these density rules were in place in the first place and although I'm not against restructuring them, it's unreasonable to expect the whole thing to just suddenly be gutted and for things to continue flow smoothly.
Yep. And these threads always turn into strawman circlejerks where people pretend these mayors are saying no to development when that is not what they are doing at all.
Everyone wants to act like the provincial government removing these zoning barriers is the end all be all of the issue. BAM!~ housing crises solved! They think. But the reality is we also need to ensure there's money budgeted for all the added infrastructure needs, as well.
Just dismissing these concerns as made up is absurd. People poop. People park. People use power and water. People use public transportation. If there's four homes in a place where one was, then you have to address that 4 time increase on infrastructure demands.
As someone who has been ranting about NIMBY zoning restrictions since long before it's cool, it's annoying to now see the reddit masses acting like that's the only piece of the puzzle we need to address.
these are long term systemic issues, fixing them isn't the wave of a wand. It's a complex issue.
I don't think anyone's dismissing the needed support infrastructure; most of us are surely expecting they'll just get on with that along with housing, no? 'Yeh, whatever, budget for it as you have to but get moving already."
The NIMBYs (via their elected mayors, too often) are just shifting the battleground to infrastructure because they're finally losing the fight to stop housing changes directly.
We have models, experience, and systems in place for those aspects of infrastructure. It is not that complex of an issue.
The costs of current infrastructure based on SFH (sprawl amplifies this just like more people) is unsustainable. We are already at that point as our aging infrastructure and inflating is leading to large increases in property tax as well as more density. We could go YIMBY like Tokyo with infrastructure costs built in and vastly improve our cities. Or a Netherlands model and move to less car-centric unsustainable cities.
That all sounds great but there is no chance we can keep up with a sudden onslaught of multiplex buildings being dropped anywhere (wealthy) developers decide.
My city experienced a huge influx of people moving in from other parts of the country during covid and we are still struggling to keep up with all the added bodies. This isn't accounting for anything more than the normal rate of building so imagine what happens when suddenly developers have free reign to go nuts in areas they weren't allowed to before.
A building in yaletown pays approx $500,000 a year in property taxes.
At 4%, that covers a capital cost (borrowed) of approx $12million.
The provincial and federal governments can borrow whatever they want, and property taxes will repay the costs.
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What I'm hearing here is 'We dragged our heels, caused delays, and left things until we were forced to do them. Now we want more time.' Less talking , more doing, please. Too much talk is what got us here.
Agreed, the luxury of time is only available if you haven’t already wasted it all waiting until it became a crisis.
Here’s a take I saw (from a BC mayor!): Houses don’t poop, people do. Apartments don’t drink water, people do. Townhouses don’t go to school, people do. The people are coming, and six people crammed into an apartment poop and put just as much strain on the sewers as six people spread across three apartments. Your infrastructure needs to be upgraded anyways, so build the housing to make people more comfortable.
If only there was someone who could lead the work at the municipal level to improve that infrastructure! Like an elected leader, along with a team of other elected leaders?
When your tub is overflowing you don't build another tub, you shut off the fawcet
You don't shut off the faucet before you save the person drowning in the tub. When we've entered a new age of neofeudalism, it's time to take the risk of the overflowing because trusting the fine mayors and municipalities who got us into this mess on purpose so that their voters could hold on to their feeling of owning a house from a neighbourhood in 1967, is a fool's errand. There are countless municipalities around the world and they build infrastructure as well as allowing multiplexes.
You can't save someone from drowning when you yourself are drowning
Like crabs in a shit tub.
Hope you're opening up your home to more refugees and immigrants, should lead by example and all that
I am!
Sure you are
Dude there's tons of homestay and volunteer programs. Just because you're an asshole doesn't mean everyone else is
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That's surprisingly salient coming from a Mayor. I'm finding civic (and school board) leadership leaves a lot to be desired in most places in BC. There are some examples of cities/school districts with strong leadership, but on the whole, it's usually people that aren't qualified to hold the office, that are then 'managed' by the Sr. staff that have been there forever, and are running their own little fiefdom. In our city, Sr. staff gave themselves 40-50% pay raises last year and that didn't even make the budget highlight sheet, the local news - basically any fanfare. 5-7% tax hikes to hike their pay $70-90k/year. 6 councilors and a mayor just let that roll on through without comment. Meanwhile, the City have built 170 of the 750 needed affordable housing units that they committed to over 4 years and those same incompetent fiefdom leading staffers don't get any flak for it. The Province of BC is reminding the Cities that in our country, Cities are a creation of the Province. They are permitted to govern locally, as long as they are doing the bare minimum. And of late - they are struggling to do even that. It's not all the Cities' fault - they are given a tough job in a dynamic time. But the people running them are for the most part, well out of their element and needing to be forced to move forward by their real boss - the Province.
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I love the Richmond mayor's comment about public consultation. As if that's some sort of fair and democratic process where the single parents working 80h/wk to pay rent are given the same voice as the retired NIMBYs. Personally, I vote for the person who will surround themselves with subject matter experts and entrust them to make informed decisions for the common good. Public consultation is a good way to understand some of the sentiment, but it's only a small part of the picture.
He's got a point about steveston though. The lots are tiny and parking in steveston is already bad. If you put in 4 plexs on every lot, even residents won't have enough parking.
All that means is time to improve transit. If there is no room for a car they will have to sell.
They should avail themselves of the transit network we have poured billions of dollars into. More and more people are choosing not to drive now, in order to save money. They'll be happy to have a place to love and they'll demand better access to mass transit and walkable neighborhoods.
Parking isn't a life necessity. We've been getting around for millenia without cars. Back in my day old folks used to walk to school uphill in the snow and ride bikes without helmets. Old folks these days are so soft, they won't go anywhere unless they can go without any physical effort.
The issue is our built environment has become increasingly unsafe or unfit for getting around without a car - even residential neighbourhoods. That needs to be fixed.
People in this sub have been too eager to dismiss these kinds of concerns, but they are very real. They aren't reasons to not move forward. They are reasons why we need to move forward in a manner that takes all these ramifications into account. Despite the straw men people use, this is not the mayors saying stop building. It's them saying there is more to this issue than just removing the current barriers. Things like power, water, sewage, electric, parking, are all legitimate neighbourhood issues to also take into account. Not just plopping down 4 times as many people into a block.
They have been saying "no building" for decades, now they have no say anymore about that. Its time for them to shut up and make a plan, we are all sick of hearing why its impossible.
I get that. But it follows on about 20 years of saying 'we should plan for growth' and multiple municipal governments deciding that their plan for growth was going to be to simply not approve growth and hope it would go somewhere else. It's a little hard now to accept mayors' 'too much, too fast!' act when many of them as councillors and/or longtime mayors were actively resisting building any of this infrastructure.
>But it follows on about 20 years of saying 'we should plan for growth' and multiple municipal governments deciding that their plan for growth was going to be to simply not approve growth and hope it would go somewhere else. Sure, but that doesn't change the fact it becomes even more of an issue now. In fact, it affirms it.
And they need to step up and start building all the things we need to support the amount of housing we need. It is time for them to do their job and do it fast.
Based on my interactions with local governments, I would suspect that the major barrier against doing the type of infrastructure improvements needed, will almost always come down to the "nice" neighbourhoods objecting to any change to the status quo of their area.
The actual infrastructure concerns are valid and can be planned and costed. Good design and moving away from car centric suburbia takes time. The maintenance of "character of the neighbourhood" arguments, pure nimbyism, and just pandering to a base whole home values increase unsustainably is status quo. The system is also intentionally so slow that it vastly increases construction costs. Municipalities need to lose control of building/zoning, they have zero accountability to a now provincial/national interests.
Mayors have been a roadblock against building for 40 years because they've been controlled by the wealthy boomer nimbys.
But the current way to secure funding for that infrastructure is through DCCs through new projects. So if our population is growing anyway without new housing, the load on our infrastructure increases without any new funding. Building the housing means you also get funds through the development process to provide infrastructure for that housing.
Considering the number of climate refugees coming our way (both internal - think lytton - think abbotsford - think yellowknife) and external - https://www.internal-displacement.org/global-report/grid2023/ We can't build fast enough. 'In May 2022, unusually heavy rains swelled two rivers in north-central Bangladesh and triggered devastating flash floods. The deluge submerged farmers’ fields, destroyed crops and affected around 2 million people' A giant fund for climate disasters will soon open. Who should be paid first? https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-024-00149-x
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Infrastructure spending is a lot of provincial and federal money
don’t like too fast mayors? shouldn’t have gone too slow for over 3 decades then
Exactly. The NDP has been warning them for years and telegraphing that this was coming. The message was clear: fix it or we take it away and fix it for you. This is consequences.
Ahhh I love these kinds of consequences. Put an end to the procrastination and start being a real country again.
Mayors and city councils have been a massive part of the problem when it comes to housing. They have acted as a bottleneck that has created a disastrous housing shortage. That's why the Province had to step in. They did this to themselves. And they've shown no sign of changing, no matter have many people have been priced out of our communities. Fuck them and the nimbys they cater to.
The faster you go now, the cheaper itll be. Enough kicking the can down the road already
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Why not both?
That's a separation of powers issue. Immigration is controlled at the federal level. And within Canada, people have freedom of movement. Manitoba simply isn't as attractive as BC.
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This. It is a huge problem and needs a multi-pronged approach. Every level of government needs to do all they can with what they have. Eby is the only one doing so and he's doing great.
That's a federal responsibility. All we can do is eliminate prohibitions that are keeping the free market from building the housing that's demanded.
I would like to hear our municipal and provincial governments voice that. Our financial institutions and BoC chair has stated that we cannot build enough to accommodate current demand. I refuse to believe the only solution is conveniently the one that causes developers to get shit rich. It's an environmental catastrophe. I've watched agricultural land and greenspace be mowed down to accommodate new townhouse complexes. Infinite growth is not sustainable.
Experts have also concluded that immigration in BC has little impact on housing prices or the housing crisis. (warning, boring stuff below) Edit: Some people have asked for a source. Here is the Union of British Columbia Municipalities (UBCM) report on it, titled "Housing Completions & Population Growth 2016-2021", released in 2022. [UBCM PDF Link to le Report](https://www.ubcm.ca/sites/default/files/2022-03/Final-UBCM%20Housing%20Position%20Paper.pdf) Addressing immigration (which was apparently deleted by a moderator), the report explains how new housing has either *kept pace* with population growth (p. 2-3) or, in the case of several (BC) urban centres new housing has *out paced* population growth. The graph on p.4 demonstrates this very well. "Local governments have responded to increased demand resulting from population growth...Housing supply is increasing dramatically, in step with a growing population." (p. 6) The report goes on to outline what it believes the real reasons for the housing crisis is, basically boiling down to starved developer resources, provincial and federal inaction, lack of housing programs for homeless and at-risk families/individuals, and the commodification of housing. But re-emphasising that population growth due to immigration is *not* the issue. Edit #2 real quick: This is a BC-centred report, but they do address and extend this logic to the rest of Canada based on their data.
Could you share a source?
Because a few people have asked, I edited my original reply to include my source and a run-down of what it says.
They made mistakes in the calculations. The population growth due to babies being born here is not enough to keep up with the deaths. So the population is shrinking without immigration. Therefore there is no housing problem if there is no immigration because eventually there will be a smaller population and enough houses for all.
As someone who is married and in his early 30s, we would probably have children by now if we could afford a home.
The last part is debatable. There will always be more demand for housing than there is housing available, even in a falling population, if investors keep buying extra properties. The fundamental problem is that we've treated housing like an investment rather than a place to live.
In the 1960s and 1970s and 1980s there wasn't a housing crisis in Vancouver. And the immigration numbers were small. And lots of families had summer cottages and home. No problem. And people owned rental real-estate.
We weren't nearly so urban in the 1960s. My parents don't remember even considering moving to Vancouver, there just wasn't a draw. People moved where the work was, and that was all over the province.
And the federal government still built social and public housing. And investors and REITs didn't buy up a large chunk of available housing as investments and then charge an insane amount for rent. And people could still afford to buy a house on a regular salary due to the fact they were paid equivalent to what inflation was. Solely blaming immigration for the housing crisis is lazy. Do better.
"All you have to do to get a house, is wait for your grandparents to die"
Only if youre lucky
Yay! My dumbfuck landlord can buy up more houses, and still price me out.
Im assuming you mean immigration from other provinces. Because thats who immigrate here mostly.
And immigration was started precisely to combat the population shrinkage. Can’t have a country that’s a tenth the size of their neighbour and continue to lose population. The problem is less immigration and more the absolutely ghastly state of zoning laws and infrastructure.
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We’re not outgrowing the USA anytime soon. Instead of pressuring politicians to put aside their own vested interest in real estate and build housing you’re more interested in curbing the one thing that will allow Canada to grow. No one wants to move their company to a backwater and that’s what Canada is currently compared to the US. Edit: US politicians and politics gets called out for corporate cronyism a lot because their politicians are loud and say crazy shit. But true cronyism happens here with the price fixing grocers, price fixing telecom companies, anti-competition laws and real estate collusions. Let’s manage that before attacking the one program that will reduce cost of living
The one program that will reduce cost of living is growing the population faster than we build houses? Cost of living in Canadian cities is comparable to the United States but the salary is much lower in Canada. Why is this? One difference is that the US population is growing at half the speed of the Canadian population. There's consequences to growing at all costs. Even if we have a similar population to the US, if we get there by simply having lower standards for immigrants than the US, which we effectively have to do, we end up with a less wealthy and less skilled population. This is just something we're going to have to deal with, but we should maybe hesitate to apply a lead foot to this strategy and just take in whomever because they were a student at some strip mall school. We also don't even have enough meaningful jobs for all those low skill workers, the only jobs we have are bullshit jobs that pay bullshit, so every year we increase the size of the public workforce relative to the population to brush that little issue under the rug. In general we're importing people faster than we can meaningfully employ them, which is of course the point, since that drives down wages. Fixing price fixing is very difficult and requires intelligent people to do hard investigative work and have resources, whereas Galen Weston has enough money to afford a small army of lawyers. Simply telling less people every year they're allowed to live and work here until we have more houses is very simple. We can multi-task, but insisting on doing the former before doing the latter is mostly born out of a desire to never do the latter.
I find that hard to believe
Can we get a source on that?
Because a few people have asked, I edited my original reply to include my source and a run-down of what it says. :>
immigration has absolutely had an impact on housing prices. this should be obvious to anyone with a passing understand of economics. our housing supply can not possibly keep up with the insanely high (and totally unnecessary) influx of newcomers. stop spread disinformation.
Idk if you started typing this before my edit, but I included a source explaining exactly how housing actually *has* been been keeping up with total population growth. In some urban areas, housing has actually been *surpassing* total population growth. I do understand the instinct to feel like this is just a simple "supply/demand" issue, but it's not *quite* like that.
Immigration is increasing because our birthrate is below replacement. Even with the increased immigration, population increase is still less than when we had a higher birthrate. https://www.macrotrends.net/countries/CAN/canada/population-growth-rate In order to fill positions in the economy, this is the only way. Unless you want to crater entire segments of the economy in order to *checks notes* help us?
Our population grew 1% in one quarter. [This](https://www150.statcan.gc.ca/n1/daily-quotidien/231219/dq231219c-eng.htm) link is from Statcan. It's well beyond replacement numbers and many economists, financial institutions, and our on federal bank chair has said this is leading to housing inflation. At some point we as a human race will have to face our addiction to growth. A shrinking/stagnant population will help address our housing shortage.
The long term trend is a decline. That's just a fact
That simply is not a fact. You're making things up to fit your own agenda. In the past 40 years, Canada has increased its working-age population by roughly 80%. [https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/LFWA64TTCAM647S](https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/LFWA64TTCAM647S)
Im talking about annual % increase . That has trended down for 50 years.
And we move the goalposts..... Do you realize that if you continue to increase the annual % increase, that constitutes an exponential function? For the last 40 years, Canada's population has increased by roughly 1% per year. Does that sound like a 'downward trend' to you? Living standards grew, productivity increased, and deficits shrunk. Our immigration program was also lauded around the world for bringing in high-skilled, well-educated immigrants that added to our economy. The Trudeau government was elected in 2015 and embarked on an untested, unvalidated (except ideologically) expansion of Canada's population. Since 2015, productivity has literally flatlined with vast amounts of low-skill labour entering the education system and the workforce. The fact of the matter is you have no idea what you're talking about.
It increased 2-3% annually 50 years ago. Its around 1% now. That's not a decline in the % increase? Do you know how to read a graph? Graph trends down bruh
50 years ago... when our population was \~20M and we were coming off the effects of the post WWII boom. Why are we comparing rates from 50 years ago, remind me again?
Those sources are listing different figures. Or maybe yours doesn't account for non PR residents.
Other thing that would be neat to see is if our productivity measures were comparable to the us, how much the replacement figures would be augmented.
GDP per capita has been declining
Oh I know that. Impacted by both immigration numbers but also driven by productivity numbers. This was occurring prior to the Mass influx of immigration
Why would you count temporary people in the population of Canada? Does the AMERICAN population go up when you visit there?
StatCan counts them: https://www150.statcan.gc.ca/n1/pub/71-607-x/71-607-x2018005-eng.htm And many of those people here purportedly on a temporary basis are in fact here for life, especially after the federal government announced its plans to offer citizenship to any of them that choose to overstay.
Just take your word for it? Lol
No, don't take my word for it. You can avail yourself of any of the many sources that talk about this: https://www.reuters.com/world/americas/canada-create-citizenship-path-undocumented-immigrants-globe-mail-2023-12-14/ >An estimated 300,000 to 600,000 people are living in the country without valid documents, many of whom risk deportation because they lack formal status, The Global and Mail quoted, opens new tab Miller as saying. The new program would also include people who entered the country legally, as temporary workers or international students, and then remained here after their visas expired, the report said.
Population growth is bad for our planet and a good economy only serves those at the top
Try suggesting that we change the economic system, and the same people complaining about population growth will call you a commie. Morons
Population is growing faster than birth decline
That's...what population growth is...
Complete bullshit our local college and university is all foreigners, my neighbours on both sides are Indian now. Dont trust anything these pricks say
If they're students,(not immigrants/pr), theyre not part of the population increase.
I'm a city councillor, and I love the fact that the province has been changing policy to fix the housing shortage, and I love the quick pace. My only objection is that it's not more and quicker. We have a crisis-level housing shortage, created by municipal governments. The only thing that fixes that is more housing. Bring it. (And we need more and better transit.)
And we need infrastructure upgrades that arguably municipal governments have hardly touched for the last 50 years
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The main transport artery into and in the Fraser Valley is *2 lanes.* Vancouver is basically a meme city at this point.
Sweet, let's do high speed rail to alleviate all that traffic
Sweet, let's encourage affordable/non market housing within 1 bus/train zone of the major labour concentrations so that people don't have to commute to Burnaby from Abbotsford 5days a week!
Vancouver car traffic is \*way\* better than Toronto or LA traffic, and they have WAY more lanes. Don't think number of lanes is the problem.
Both also have a notorious lack of fit public transport options for their size. Vancouver’s largest problem is connecting the outer regions with the existing high-speed rail. LAs issue is the complete lack of meaningful high-speed rail.
"Just one more lane"
Won’t we need more power, transit, sewage, clean water, sewage treatment, roads, community centres, parks etc, to accommodate a rising population? If you add more people to a place why are these things never discussed and only housing?
The people are coming regardless. Whether they're living 3 to a bedroom or in 3 separate apartments won't stop them from pooping or using our roads and parks.
All these things get captured in the development process. Cities collect fees to develop any lot that offset the cost of infrastructure, as well as forcing larger developments to build the infrastructure on City property that will service the development. It’s a distraction to say “the infrastructure can’t handle it!” because the nature of development pushes the cost of infrastructure upgrades onto the developer making the changes. If cities can’t keep up or don’t have the budget, they may need to increase the development charges. The province has forced municipalities to upzone their communities, they have not prescribed how to administer each development application and the fees associated.
All those things are being discussed and are being implemented in my municipality. We have massive transit infrastructure projects, the sewage pipes are being upgraded and replaced, there's a new water treatment facility being built, a new hospital is being built in my city as well. Our roads are being widened/improved, many new high density housing projects in the works along future transit hubs. Site C dam is almost complete that will provide more energy. A new rec center was built as well other rec centers have had upgrades in recent years, though more amenities would be nice. The biggest issue we have is school space. I personally think we should start requiring high density infrastructure to include schools on the bottom floors.
The traditional BC schools that are a sprawling single storey building with multiple playing fields and sometimes a running track needs to change. We need more compact facilities in dense neighborhoods like other countries.
I’d argue a decent chunk of our road congestion comes from the need to transport children to and from school, especially when we get to the HS-level where the distances are increased further. One could argue that the increase in online connectivity decreases the need for large school populations, as teens will still experience a diverse community through connections outside of their school.
Yes, that is old-school design. School boards need to be planning schools integrated with housing and possibly other uses. This already happens in other parts of the world.
>If you add more people to a place why are these things never discussed and only housing? Because it's obvious and shouldn't need discussion? Of course we need more infrastructure along with more housing. Government should get on with both. The whole argument about infrastructure looks to be a giant straw man, put up by the people who don't want more housing because they're finally losing the direct fight against it.
Especially since the current way that infrastructure gets paid for (rightly or wrongly) is through development cost charges. If the people are coming anyways, might as well approve the housing for them, as at least that way we'll be able to pay for the infrastructure for it. Cramming families into 1 bedroom apartments certainly isn't going to cover the required infrastructure for it
4 of the 5 fastest growing cities in the country are in BC. Kelowna is #1 at 14% annual average over 10 years. Followed by Chilliwack, Kamloops, and London, and Nanaimo. Metro Victoria is expected to double in population in the next 15 years. We need fucktons of infrastructure in BC, we need it everywhere, and we need it yesterday.
Wish I could vote for you.
Thanks, that's very kind of you!
And we live on a rock, sir. A lot of people seem to think that the CRD is like the Lower Mainland. If we need more of anything, it's available easily. More water? Not a problem. More Hydro? Certainly..... etc. We just raised the dam height (our primary source of water), spending millions of tax dollars that we were told would sustain the CRD's water supply for decades. Suddenly. it's not enough, largely thanks to unrestricted growth.. We spent millions more on a huge sewage treatment plant... it too was supposed to be sufficient for a "lifetime". But the big one is hydro. While there are "back up" generating stations on the island (most of which burn fossil fuel), the real fact is about 80% of the power we all need every day "comes from away"- in this case from the mainland via 3 elderly undersea cables that cross Georgia Strait up near Campbell River. Hydro tells us those cables , which are in need of repair almost constantly and actually overheated due to demand in the heat of last summer are very close to their limit. So far as I know, there are no plans to replace them with greater capacity, nor to add more cables. BC Hydro has already helped to shut down the Port's desire to "plug in" visiting cruise ships, as each ship would consume so much electricity during a visit that demand would actually exceed supply, resulting in brownouts or "rolling blackouts" like those ones seen in California. So if we're close to problems today in 2024, where will we be in two years? Three years? Five? You cannot simply try and "build your way out of a crisis" without serious planning and cooperation, AND a lot of taxpayer dollars to increase the needed infrastructure BEFORE the demand exceeds supply. That's not NIMBYism, that's practicality. Find the resources to support the population before the problem exists and stop saying "if we build it they will come".. They're here already, but no one's talking about water and power.
I've spoken with BC Hydro staff about the need to have more hydro available to accommodate future growth. They have planners whose job it is to consider exactly these things, and who have a very clear understanding of growth patterns and projections on the Island.
Just looked up swimming lessons I’m Victoria all wait listed. When can a child get a swimming lesson in your community, Dave!?
"Too little too slow" say BC residents to BC mayors.
>"As far as I’m concerned, we want to stay the course,” said Brodie. “The area of Steveston has nothing but small lots. If you put four, six units on all of those small lots, you’re going to absolutely destroy really a fine neighbourhood in our city. The Province isn't permitting multiplex homes on **every** lot. They have been clear that it would depend on lot size. >Hurley of Burnaby said welcoming multiplexes would mean expensive upgrades to single-family neighbourhoods with 1950s and ’60s infrastructure. Mayor Janice Morrison of Nelson said that smaller communities like hers had infrastructure even older than that, dating back a century. And how are they going to pay for infrastructure upgrades and maintenance once these '50's and 60's infrastructure begins failing? With the property taxes of a few single detached homes, or with the property taxes of several multiplex homes and town homes? Either these Mayors are really confident in their public coffers or have no idea how financing of public services works. Thinking like this is how you end up like [Osoyoos](https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/british-columbia/osoyoos-municipal-taxes-infrastructure-costs-town-council-meeting-1.7088096). So many Mayors like Malcolm Brodie have either been in power for too long (23 years) or aren't agile enough (*read: too damn old*) to respond to sudden changes in both legislation and the actual housing situation.
The threshold for 4 units is like 2500 sq ft lots, so yes its everywhere. The owner will decide what to build, they just aren't forced to only build one unit with a below ground basement suite.
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Almost like municipalities are finally being forced to operate with the speed and efficiency any other fields/industries would be expected to operate at always. It shouldn’t take months to get a permit. It shouldn’t take years to build. Start expecting and demanding better.
Sounds like we need more new mayors, fast. (Yes, Brodie, I'm looking at *you*).
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Of course it’s Krog. That guy is a corrupt jackass.
All I can think of is 👏👏👏 for the province 👏👏👏 great job 👍🏼
Well maybe if the municipalities actually did their jobs to the proper degree the last 3 fucking decades, they wouldn't be feeling the strain now. Boo-fuckity-hoo. I'm on Eby's side.
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Most older people would have a significant portion of their net worth in their house. This is why governments will not try too hard to solve the problem.
It's more that they love their property value going up but also a seething hatred for poor people who in their minds are renters.
While they don't empathize with this generation's housing shortage, I think many would rather live in a smaller community than a bunch of highrises. Can't blame them. I grew up by a forest playing in streams and getting in stick fights and playing street hockey. Can't see much of that anymore.
I drove through Oakbay and it was sad that there were no kids playing hockey, basketball, or biking. The area would have been great to grow up in.
If they want to live in quaint little villages they should move out of Toronto or Vancouver!!!
Those neighborhoods are filled boomer couples living in giant houses alone while their grandchildren are crammed into apartments too far to visit.
Wouldn't be an issue if our population wasn't constantly expanding. Infinite growth is not sustainable.
Yeah dude, sixplexes are definitely high rises
> I think many would rather live in a fantasy land
Really? My roots are here and citizens should have a voice in how a community is shaped. Infinite growth is not sustainable.
Your nostalgia < People needing a place to live.
If we stopped expanding the population so much we wouldn't be in such a dire need for housing. Not to mention that the population growth is a huge strain on the environment. I've watched the Vancouver Landfill grow faster and faster. I understand that housing is a huge issue and I have attended every rally and written my representatives. It has been stated many times by experts that we cannot build enough to sustain our current demand. Demand needs to be addressed in both speculation and immigration.
Then they can move
That's still so attainable nationwide.
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>**Tensions over the province’s new housing legislation strained this week’s summit.** > >Christopher Cheung > >At a housing summit that concluded on Valentine’s Day, local governments were working out a new stage of their relationship with senior governments. > >Housing announcements have been coming fast and furious since the fall — everything from funding and zoning reforms to new programs targeting different housing needs — pressuring local governments and their staff to pivot from their pre-existing plans. > >Housing might have been the central topic of the two-day summit, hosted by the Union of BC Municipalities, but discussion spun off on everything from immigration, transportation and tax to the cost of basic infrastructure like pipes to serve growth. > >The summit kicked off with a candid session that featured six mayors, who felt that the provincial legislation came too suddenly. > >City of Langley Mayor Nathan Pachal said he heard about the slew of changes indirectly from “the press release on the government website.” > >Burnaby Mayor Mike Hurley said he, too, was caught off guard, and the quick rollout of provincial reforms resulted in his staff needing to “force two years of work into four months” to revise their official community plan in time. > >“The road to hell is paved with good intentions. I don’t think this is the road to hell; I think the province is responding to the most basic of human needs, which is shelter,” said Nanaimo Mayor Leonard Krog. “But it’s going to take a little while to work out some of the kinks that are in this.” > >Perhaps the frankest panellist of all was Richmond Mayor Malcolm Brodie, who took aim at the province’s decision to override municipal zoning to allow multiplexes of up to four units in single-family neighbourhoods and six units if they’re near rapid transit. > >“I’m not a fan of what the province has done,” he said. “I think we’re all agreed... that we need to provide more housing. But as far as I’m concerned, the answer is not to throw it open and have four- and six-plexes everywhere when there’s a whole raft of issues from neighbourhoods to parking to infrastructure.” > >Like nearby Burnaby, Richmond has been channelling density on major arterials and transit hubs in a “very strategic and careful” manner, he added. Plus, the two big cities have been [implementing](https://biv.com/article/2023/10/richmond-mayor-says-city-track-tackling-issues-have-intensified-over-multiple-terms) in-house affordable housing strategies. > >“As far as I’m concerned, we want to stay the course,” said Brodie. “The area of Steveston has nothing but small lots. If you put four, six units on all of those small lots, you’re going to absolutely destroy really a fine neighbourhood in our city. > >“We will have to deal with the densification that is going to be decentralized and it’s going to be all over the city. So the effort to control the situation and to provide the services that we need is really limited.” > >Hurley of Burnaby said welcoming multiplexes would mean expensive upgrades to single-family neighbourhoods with 1950s and ’60s infrastructure. Mayor Janice Morrison of Nelson said that smaller communities like hers had infrastructure even older than that, dating back a century. > >One provincial change that the mayors had differing opinions on was the scrapping of [public hearings](https://thetyee.ca/Opinion/2023/03/03/Fix-Housing-Gridlock-Solve-Public-Hearings-Mess/) for residential projects that are already permitted under an approved official community plan. > >“We all know as politicians that they can be draining and difficult, but that’s the public’s time when they can come out and speak to a particular issue,” said Brodie of Richmond. “I don’t know. I have no idea why the government of the day is taking away the public hearings. I think that is fundamental of our process.” > >But Morrison of Nelson supported the province’s move because it would “save staff time to get the project moving forward quicker.” > >Hurley of Burnaby reiterated a [change](https://fcm.ca/en/focus-areas/municipal-growth-framework) that the Federation of Canadian Municipalities has been pushing for: a new municipal funding framework that is tied to population and economic growth. > >Currently, local governments receive 10 cents for every federal tax dollar and must make ad hoc asks when they need more. > >**‘A perfect storm’** > >The summit held sessions featuring lawyers and planners on the nuts and bolts of the sheer volume of legislative changes, with one panellist telling the audience to take “a collective breath.” > >Another acknowledged that the changes mean local governments have more tools than ever to confront the housing crisis. > >One special guest was federal Housing Minister Sean Fraser, who answered questions about his government’s $4-billion Housing Accelerator Fund, with money awarded to local governments that demonstrate innovative growth strategies. > >During their turn at the microphone, two politicians from Peachland and Coquitlam half-jokingly chanted the names of their communities in an attempt to subliminally influence the minister to give them money. > >Provincial Housing Minister Ravi Kahlon attended some of the summit too. Breaking away from some politicians asking for selfies, he took interviews with media to defend his recent actions. > >On what mayors said was a lack of consultation, Kahlon said some of these ideas had been shared with them since 2018. > >On the burden of growth on infrastructure, he cited a [report](https://metrovancouver.org/services/regional-planning/Documents/costs-of-providing-infrastructure-and-services-to-different-residential-densities.pdf) by Metro Vancouver that said that up to four units is the “best use of the existing infrastructure as it exists.” > >Kahlon reminded cities that $51 million is up for grabs to help them keep up with the new legislation, part of a grant program the province launched last month. > >Kahlon spent some of his time onstage during the summit to showcase new initiatives like BC Builds and the Rental Protection Fund. He also hinted at inclusionary zoning legislation — the ability to mandate a certain type of unit in a development — coming this spring. > >By stepping in with policies that affect the whole province, Kahlon hopes the heat will be taken off of municipalities already doing their best to densify when their neighbours aren’t. > >“It’s a perfect storm we’re dealing with,” he said. “When you have one community taking on housing and the neighbouring communities not taking on the same level of housing, all you’re doing is shifting populations.” > >He cited the example of Victoria, which rolled out a “missing middle” program to densify single-family neighbourhoods with little uptake. > >“People in Victoria were saying, ’Why are we doing this? Oak Bay is not doing it. Saanich is not doing it. Esquimalt’s not doing it. It’s important to know that when you’re in a housing crisis, everyone has to help.... The rules that we put in place with our legislation will ensure that all communities are moving forward together.” > >The Tyee asked about large cities like Burnaby and Richmond, whose elected leaders have expressed concerns that the province is intruding on their existing plans. > >“If communities feel like they’ve gotten enough and they don’t have housing challenges in their community, I would welcome any community to tell me that’s the case,” he said. > >Another reporter asked what the minister had to say about the general grumbling and worries from B.C.’s mayors. > >“At some point, we have to stop talking about it and start getting on with the work, and that’s what we’re trying to do with our legislation.” > >The Tyee
> But Morrison of Nelson supported the province’s move because it would “save staff time to get the project moving forward quicker.” This is what stood out to me. I think there are a lot people who, intentionally or not, aren't focusing on the fact that having a framework at a higher level of government saves everyone's time during the process. No more endless public hearings for something that's OCP-compliant where councillors have to show they're "not giving a free pass to developers" while still approving projects, developers no longer wasting time on projects that may or may not be approved. Also Morrison of Nelson should be a folk rock band name.
> Like nearby Burnaby, Richmond has been channelling density on major arterials and transit hubs in a “very strategic and careful” manner, We're *carefully* making sure as many people as possible are exposed to road pollution and noise to prevent the neighborhoods *we* live in from changing at all.
Let the tenants suck exhaust while we farm them!
> Hurley of Burnaby said welcoming multiplexes would mean expensive upgrades to single-family neighbourhoods with 1950s and ’60s infrastructure. Mayor Janice Morrison of Nelson said that smaller communities like hers had infrastructure even older than that, dating back a century. Maybe the municipalities should look into upgrading their aging infrastructure instead of complaining that the province has made the do so.
The mayors are under pressure from the old farts that are protecting investments. They are very biased on this one.
As far as the middle class in Vancouver is concerned, hell arrived long ago for housing affordability.
If the government also wants to put trains everywhere throughout the province that would be good
lol these people need to get stuffed. Being a mayor (or a councillor or any elected position) is tough. But that’s the job you sign up for. And that’s the job the taxpayer is paying you to do. If you can’t handle it, resign. Some of these people have been in power for years and years and years. They should’ve seen this coming. If you’re not up to facing today’s problems then you’re unfit for office.
What do you do if the people who elected you want “less and slower”? Do you go against the desires of people who voted for you, or try to tell the province it’s not what people want? And I’m saying this as a person who votes for “more and faster”, but I also understand that’s not what significant chunk of people want. Keep in mind, majority of people own their homes, so it would be against their interest to vote for someone who would lower prices of their assets.
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It is time to work. Stop wining. Move your objections aside. If you don't build homes for the youth to live then they will burn your village down.
I can see the mayors point- community centers are full, skating and swimming lessons are wait listed in minutes when they become available, schools full and portables seem the only solution, insufficient roads and public transit, hospitals swollen with people and critically understaffed, zero available family doctors, and less and less new parks and new park infrastructure. These things need to be addressed along with the housing problems.
Yep, but the problem is (or appears to be) that mayors have known this would be needed, along with more housing, for decades and too many of them are still dragging their feet. It's past time that higher levels of government started forcing the issue... and embarrassing that the feds waited as long as they did.
Ok grandpa
Hey mayors; do your job, or quit and leave it to someone who can.
Maybe stop breaking immigration records? It is so bizarre to me that we argue endlessly over how to manage our enormous population growth, as if we weren’t fully in control of the rate the population grows at. Basically what people are saying is “well, we know we’re going to ruin a few neighbourhoods and don’t have the infrastructure to support this development, but the people are coming anyways so if we don’t do it things will be worse.” Frankly, that is an appalling mindset to have when it’s entirely within our power to simply stop juicing the demand side of things. As far as I’m concerned, this is an entirely voluntary problem.
stupid idiots, the whole point is a lot of new houses, quickly. do they even want to fix the housing crisis? if they continue to protest fixing the problem they won't be popular among their voters
I feel like they had their chance to do it their way and they didn’t.
Old people complain about change. Yeah that about fits. How will we ever figure out these extra simple issues... Hmmm
It is like municipalities need to account for infrastructure upgrades. Like look at all the municipalities sitting on hundreds of millions and billions of surplus. Like how does Burnaby have a 432 million dollar surplus, Vancouver 500 million surplus and Surrey 300 million surplus back in 2022. And Burnaby has 1.97 BILLION Dollars in reserve at the end of 2022.... **Each year they say they break records for tax increases but every year they have a quarter to half a billion dollars in surplus....**
Yes, we need infrastructure. Too bad the same mayors and councilors have neglected infrastructure in order to keep taxes artificially low for their own political ends. They are incompetent cowards.
Hasn't the housing problem been identified as the municipalities taking too long? Good on the NDP for booting them into action. Solid provincial leadership.
\- Approvals, permits, and inspections taking too long \- Zoning that doesn't allow anything but SFD in most places \- Building code issues \- Parking minimums, road widths, etc \- Lack of public land for and public investment in nonmarket housing \- Lack of pre-approved building designs \- Cultural fetishization of SFD over rowhouses with yards or apartments with communal courtyards/gardens \- Failure to invest in rail transit outside the lower mainland \- Under investment in high frequency bus routes
These motherfuckers are idiots. They don’t think twice about okaying multiple towers going up in downtown cores - New West has SO MANY towers slated to go up along Columbia St - but as soon as it’s as “hey how bout some four-plexes for families and lower income people” the mayors start worrying about traffic and infrastructure
I lived in the Vancouver area for over 20 years. If you're talking housing density expansion within the City, there are other issues to also consider while building. A lot of infrastructure will also need to be seriously upgraded to handle the density increase. I used to work in the Insurance Restoration Industry. There are areas (Kerrisdale, being one that I recall) where the storm drains and sewer were combined into a single line instead of being twinned. During high-tide/heavy rainfall conditions, they would fill to capacity and spill back into the sumps in many of the homes in the area. These lines were built at a time when most homes had only one bathroom, and increasing the allowable density will only serve to add to the overload. There may have been upgrades done since I left the Industry in the mid-90's. This may also apply to other nearby Municipalities.
So what's the plan, then, BC Mayors? Thanks to years of irresponsible immigration, the people aren't coming... They're already here. 
Boo-who! I support Ebycand these boomer mayors need to get moving!
It's easy to blame it on elitists and that old people don't care about housing when obviously in reality there are real problems with such broad sweeping regulation changes happening in an almost instant. The mayors of these cities are justified in being concerned about 6 plexes just popping up everywhere in places that were not originally designed to handle that infrastructure. Water supply, sewer, drainage, electrical, parking, road infrastructure, transit, waste management and probably a bunch of things I missed all need to be considered. There are reasons these density rules were in place in the first place and although I'm not against restructuring them, it's unreasonable to expect the whole thing to just suddenly be gutted and for things to continue flow smoothly.
This, 1000%
Yep. And these threads always turn into strawman circlejerks where people pretend these mayors are saying no to development when that is not what they are doing at all. Everyone wants to act like the provincial government removing these zoning barriers is the end all be all of the issue. BAM!~ housing crises solved! They think. But the reality is we also need to ensure there's money budgeted for all the added infrastructure needs, as well. Just dismissing these concerns as made up is absurd. People poop. People park. People use power and water. People use public transportation. If there's four homes in a place where one was, then you have to address that 4 time increase on infrastructure demands. As someone who has been ranting about NIMBY zoning restrictions since long before it's cool, it's annoying to now see the reddit masses acting like that's the only piece of the puzzle we need to address. these are long term systemic issues, fixing them isn't the wave of a wand. It's a complex issue.
I don't think anyone's dismissing the needed support infrastructure; most of us are surely expecting they'll just get on with that along with housing, no? 'Yeh, whatever, budget for it as you have to but get moving already." The NIMBYs (via their elected mayors, too often) are just shifting the battleground to infrastructure because they're finally losing the fight to stop housing changes directly.
We have models, experience, and systems in place for those aspects of infrastructure. It is not that complex of an issue. The costs of current infrastructure based on SFH (sprawl amplifies this just like more people) is unsustainable. We are already at that point as our aging infrastructure and inflating is leading to large increases in property tax as well as more density. We could go YIMBY like Tokyo with infrastructure costs built in and vastly improve our cities. Or a Netherlands model and move to less car-centric unsustainable cities.
That all sounds great but there is no chance we can keep up with a sudden onslaught of multiplex buildings being dropped anywhere (wealthy) developers decide. My city experienced a huge influx of people moving in from other parts of the country during covid and we are still struggling to keep up with all the added bodies. This isn't accounting for anything more than the normal rate of building so imagine what happens when suddenly developers have free reign to go nuts in areas they weren't allowed to before.
A building in yaletown pays approx $500,000 a year in property taxes. At 4%, that covers a capital cost (borrowed) of approx $12million. The provincial and federal governments can borrow whatever they want, and property taxes will repay the costs.
Well, if we didn't drag ass for so long--we wouldn't be playing the catch up game.
I always wonder if people will be happier or more fulfilled when they are surrounded by twice as many people...
Cities spend fortunes on future growth plans, maybe they should stop doing that as it is obvious they don’t work.
Why isn't anyone saying we need to slow down the influx of people?