Analysis: Motion's defeat shows most of council prefers "status quo" on housing, councillor says.
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Vancouver council has voted against exploring ways to make it easier and less expensive to build co-ops and social housing.
OneCity Coun. Christine Boyle had introduced a motion seeking to direct staff to research and report back on ways to, in effect, boost production of non-market homes by allowing the non-profit sector to build bigger buildings more quickly.
But the motion was defeated late Tuesday night after several hours of sometimes-heated debate.
Boyle said Wednesday that the vote sends a “clear message that the majority of councillors were sticking with our status quo approach” on creating more affordable housing in a notoriously unaffordable city.
“It certainly feels like we are not addressing the housing crisis at the scale of the crisis. We are making small, little tinkering changes in the face of an enormous challenge,” Boyle said. “And while we stall and delay, people’s lives are being massively impacted. There are real costs and real impacts to the lack of action, and maintaining the status quo.”
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The councillors who voted down Boyle’s motion cited the opposition they heard from many members of the public. More than 125 people signed up to address council, an unusually high public turnout for a councillor’s motion. Council members who opposed the motion Tuesday also said they wanted to wait for other reports on housing, which are expected soon from staff.
Boyle’s motion looked to build on council’s decision last month to approve bylaw amendments, as recommended by city staff, to fast-track social housing in certain apartment zones of the city, by allowing non-profit housing providers to build up to six storeys without going through rezoning, which adds significant additional time, cost and uncertainty.
There was controversy facing the six-storey proposal from some areas, including parts of Mount Pleasant, Kitsilano, Grandview-Woodland, and Marpole. Some residents said eliminating the requirement for a rezoning removed too much transparency and public participation from the process.
But non-profits were unanimous in their comments to council last month: Although they supported fast-tracking six-storey projects, they wanted the proposal to go higher and further. Boyle’s new motion essentially sought to do that.
First, Boyle’s motion sought to direct staff to review the possibility of increasing to 12 storeys in those apartment zones. The motion would also direct staff to report on considerations to allow some amount of additional height and density for social housing in other zones of the city — including mixed commercial-residential areas and low-density neighbourhoods currently dominated by single detached houses and duplexes.
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Despite some pushback against the earlier staff proposal allowing some six-storey social housing projects to skip the rezoning process, council voted last month to approve the changes, with no one voting in opposition. (Coun. Colleen Hardwick abstained, and Green Coun. Michael Wiebe recused himself, citing the risk of perceived conflict because he owns property in one of the affected areas).
But Boyle’s motion this month, while also supported again by non-profit housing officials, appeared to be too much for most of the councillors who supported last month’s changes.
The proposal seemed to strike a nerve for many members of the public. The list of speakers included many familiar faces who regularly address council, both in support or opposition of various housing projects. But several speakers also said this motion had prompted them to address council for the first time.
Hardwick, the only council member present at last month’s meeting who did not support fast-tracking six-storey social housing projects, quoted members of the public who called the changes proposed in Boyle’s motion “anti-democratic.”
“To be sidestepping a public process as important as this undermines the public trust fundamentally,” Hardwick said. “I think the overwhelming opposition we heard today speaks to that.”
Boyle’s motion would have directed staff to review the matter and report, meaning at least another couple of opportunities for public participation and debate before a final decision on amending any bylaws or policies.
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The proposal failed by a vote of seven to three. Along with Boyle, independent Mayor Kennedy Stewart and COPE Coun. Jean Swanson voted in support.
Green councillors Adriane Carr and Pete Fry opposed it, as did all five councillors elected with the Non-Partisan Association: Hardwick, Melissa De Genova, Rebecca Bligh, Lisa Dominato, and Sarah Kirby-Yung (all but De Genova have since quit the NPA to sit as independents). Wiebe recused himself again, for the same reason he did for last month’s vote concerning the same areas of the city.
Following the motion’s defeat, Boyle said she looks forward to hearing tangible proposals from her council colleagues that confront the scale of the housing crisis.
“Part of what I find frustrating is the lack of alternative options,” Boyle said. “If you’re not going to support this, what else are you putting on the table that’s going to get us where we need to be?”
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