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Why can’t Vancouver solve its homelessness problem?

October 14th, 2014 · 17 Comments

I wrote a little essay on this and the computer ate it. So here is my story from the Globe on this topic, all by itself, although there are lots of other interesting aspects and side issues to this.

Categories: Uncategorized

  • Cameron Gray

    We appear to have moved from prioritizing the homeless and those at risk of homelessness (including SRO residents) to the homeless, then to only the street homeless and now just the chronic homeless, narrowing the definition of deserving homeless as we go. That may make it easier to achieve artificial objectives but it does nothing to solve homelessness or the greater problem of low income households paying far too much for poor and inadequate housing. All it does is stigmatize all those who have not spent a winter outside (is that what makes a homeless person chronically homeless?) as undeserving of taxpayer support along with all those who live in non-profit rental housing and co-operatives across Canada. It means no subsidized housing for low income seniors or single parent families with children unless they first prove they are chronically homeless (and who will judge that?). And then there is the challenge of managing a building occupied by 150 chronically homeless, but its the over arching attitude expressed in this article that is the greatest concern.

  • Michael Kluckner

    I’m waiting to see one of the parties commit to preserving existing low-cost rental housing, especially that outside of the RM (rental replacement) zones, in order to slow the rate of people trickling out of the bottom of the market-rental buildings into homelessness. As far as I know, there’s been no move to ease regulations or otherwise support landlords who own this type of housing. “Building Affordable Housing” is an oxymoron.

  • Roger_Kemble

    People who seek civic public
    office (National too when they look at the pickings) reach beyond their capabilities
    to uphold their ambitions.

    Well meaning incumbents
    claim to seek a new mandate to complete their “good work in
    progress    ” while new faces, by virtue of their presence on the hustings,
    call them out. All very polite yunno!

    Apparently your incumbent
    mayor is promising to house the homeless, of which there are some 1,800 and
    maybe more as a cold winter closes in. I
    seem to remember that was on the table a few elections ago.

    He hasn’t broached a
    Broadway subway yet but then it’s early and the shiny trinket troglodytes are
    waiting in the wings.

    Any aspiring candidate
    can promise pretty much anything and once securely in office sit comfy for the
    next four years.

    Free Sunday parking! Free children’s swimming classes: now that is
    a polity bereft of substance.

    It’s pretty much the
    same, here in Nanaimo, where we have a C$80M conference center sitting empty year-in
    year-out and a Versailles-on-the-cheap C$19M new office
    building for the bureaucrats, all done in secrecy, with the perfectly sound old
    office building sitting empty: it’s the seismicks!

    Everywhere in the western
    world lurks, unsaid, the massive financial breakdown making politics redundant.

    The UK is still paying
    off debts incurred during the Battle of Waterloo and couldn’t survive without
    regular bailouts. No wonder the
    Rothschild’s are the richest family in the history of the world!

    John Maynard Keynes said,
    “eat drink and be merry, for tomorrow never comes”
    or words to that effect. I wonder how
    much he had in his pocket when he moved on!

  • Keith

    Not enough jobs.
    Not enough housing.
    Stagnant wages.
    Infrastructure of roads and transit not keeping up

    A moratorium on immigration for a five year period is worth a ttys to correct these issues. If it doesn’t work, reopen the floodgates.

  • jenables

    I would upvote this a thousand times if I could, because I’ve said the same thing. Ya just can’t really build affordable housing. It surprises me that people criticize GW residents for rejecting a plan that would displace so many of them. Why would any resident support a plan that made it profitable for someone to demolish their home to build something “likely not suitable for the current residents” (and yes, that is a quote from one of the plan proponents). The landlords who provide cheap rent without city incentives or fanfare are my heroes. Instead costs are waived for those who maintain and worsen the status quo.

  • Eri

    Vision’s plan is to specifically replace the current low cost rentals downtown and build new.

  • Eri

    Federal jurisdiction.

  • Keith

    Not a word of lobbying from B.C. or Vancouver elected officials

  • Kirk

    The same people who say we can’t build our way out of traffic congestion are the same people who claim we can build our way out of housing unaffordability. After years of “addressing the housing issue”, we’re now the second most expensive city in the world.

    They’re the same people who have been “addressing” drug abuse and homelessness.

    Their record sucks.

  • Eri

    Quebec is suddenly welcoming an influx of immigrants from France. Alberta needs people. The federal government is not going to shut the door and antagonize certain sections of the country because of this relatively small but medium sized town.

  • Keith

    When oil falls below 80 per barrel, Alberta will need noone

  • Eri

    You are aware of Sanctuary City? Official policy of both Vision and COPE. No reporting by police of any undocumented (illegal) immigrants.

    http://www.vancouversun.com/news/Sanctuary+City+Easing+fear+false+hope/10112080/story.html

  • Eri

    Globe behind paywall.

  • Internet made me obsolete

    It’s pretty straightforward. 30,000 people/yr from everywhere want to live in Vancouver. There is no way the industry can build that many units. Result: bidding war.
    There are only two ways to have any effect on this immutable principle: restrict immigration (to the richest, but that increases the bids so that won’t work); or have the government intervene in the market to set prices, tax or forbid speculation and decide who gets to live where. Now you’re talking Cuba, and even COPE would have a hard time selling that.
    Which wannabe politician will have the courage to admit that there is nothing anyone can do? Will a new City Plan (to slow the pace of development, presumably) deal with the prospect of a city for the wealthy? What else will they do with their wealth after investing in real estate? Nobody is talking about any of that, but it’s going to happen like it or not.

  • Michael Kluckner

    Much of the at-risk rental housing is so non-confirming, a little of it is outright dangerous. Current codes and the way the city administers them makes it extremely difficult for, say, a rooming house owner to upgrade a building — even to maintain it. If the city put some of the money it now puts into subsidizing developers of market housing into helping small-scale affordable-rental owners it just might keep some of these places going and keep the tenants from going further into a situation where the bottom is street homelessness. The poverty you see on the street, such as along Hastings around Nanaimo, is a scandal, and my guess is these people are housed to some degree. The city can’t just build itself out of this mess, especially with the federal government on the sidelines; it has to deflate the speculation that is putting so many existing buildings into the hands of condo developers.

  • jenables

    I’ve often thought that landlords providing low cost rentals should be the ones getting breaks on their property tax as opposed to say, Concord Pacific. With rising evaluations and costs each year perfectly good buildings are put at risk as selling becomes more attractive and a willing city council is ready to increase the pressure by upzoning whole blocks. I’m sad to see those three walkups on Clark/knight and 15th(i think) are doomed, betting they are nice big but affordable suites with hardwood floors and they really add some color to the area. Plus the design for their replacement was VERY ugly.

  • Michael Kluckner

    Here’s another one that clearly shows the profitability of redevelopment: a 3-house assembly for sale at 2254 – 2268 Triumph, price about $3 million, revenue as it now stands with 16 suites renting from $580 to about $800 a month of $100,000 a year. In other words, affordable housing, and maybe it isn’t really desirable housing but try to tell that to the people who live there. This is in RM-3A but there’s no rental-replacement requirement because that rule only kicks in for more than 6 units in a building. The realtor’s ad says: “Call now to find out what you can build. Call listing agent for Pro Forma that shows approx. 2.5 million profit and 47% profit margin.”

    Compare that profit margin to the $100,000 a year gross rental income; if you take 75% of that as the income after costs you’re at about 2% return on capital. That jibes with the 2009 study done for the city by CitySpaces Consulting, which showed a 2% return for purpose-built rental vs. a 40% return for condos.

    Unless the city can change those economics, either by supporting landlords or reducing land speculation, there’s little hope of preserving any of this affordable housing in the long run. And you can’t build a suite that rents for $800 a month, you can only try to preserve the ones that do.