The City of New Westminster’s new family friendly housing policy may make some housing more affordable for families, but other initiatives are aiming to improve affordability.
On June 1, New Westminster city council amended the zoning bylaw to require multi-family ownership projects to include a minimum of 30 per cent two- and three-bedroom units, with at least 10 per cent of being three-bedrooms or more. Multi-family rental projects will also be required to include a minimum of 25 per cent two- and three-bedroom units, with at least five per cent of the total project units being three-bedrooms or more.
The main goal of the new policy is to provide housing that meets the needs of families, but it will also address affordability by encouraging developers to include the two- and three-bedroom in lower priced per square footage portions of buildings such as at-grade or lower in buildings, and portions of buildings with less marketable views,
Mayor Jonathan Cote said single family homes are now approaching $1 million, so three-bedroom condos are more affordable for families.
“I think that’s where the angle of affordability comes in,” he said. “Certainly, it is a market-based solution. We are not talking about subsidized housing, at least with this program. I think there are other issues with housing that need to be addressed that are certainly not addressed with this policy.”
Brent Toderian, a planning consultant who worked on the city’s family friendly housing initiative, said the policy will help create “homes that fit families” but won’t necessarily address the issue of affordability.
“It’s a separate issue,” he told the Record. “As I told council, you need to be very clear what your goal is: to attract housing for families, or to attract affordable housing for low- to middle income families. The latter is much tougher than the former.”
Toderian, who was formerly the City of Vancouver’s chief planner, said people often told him that families can’t afford to live in downtown Vancouver.
“I would respond, ‘There’s 7,000 children in the downtown peninsula.’ Clearly there are families that can afford to live downtown. The question is, are there low- to middle-income families that can afford to live downtown?” he said. “You have to decide what your policy goal is. What New Westminster decided was that their goals was to attract families, and not to try and tackle the affordability issue because to a certain extent that’s tied to programs from the province, etc. It’s just much tougher.”
Tackling affordability may be tougher to do, but it’s something the city is hoping to address through the mayor’s housing affordability task force. The task force, comprised of council members, city staff, B.C. Housing, the Urban Development Institute and the Greater Vancouver Home Builders’ Association, is developing housing projects in New Westminster aimed at advancing the city’s affordable housing strategy.
“I’m hoping we will have some interesting stuff coming out in the fall regarding some specific projects,” Cote said. “The task force is working on a number of projects. We are hoping to see some non-market housing projects happen in the next few years. I am hoping we will have some information, on at least some of those, in the fall.”
