Housing Report spurs on more discussion on housing issues for Prince Rupert Council members

Council received a presentation from Planning Manager Myfannwy Pope, who spoke to her report detailing the findings of the City's Housing Needs Report.

We previewed the far reaching document on Monday, which was compiled by city staff and consultants CitySpaces, exploring a range of issues some familiar and long standing, others relatively newer to the community.

As part of her presentation which she observed was a high level overview of some of the takeaways from the report, Ms. Pope  took council members  through some of the key elements of the document.  

She also observed as to how it would help inform Council's future goals towards the development of housing in the community.  

From her slideshow presentation, among some of the key contributors to the housing crisis in Prince Rupert is the anticipation of growth for the community ahead due to port growth, the age of the current stock of housing, the difficult construction component such as access to supplies, labour shortages and geological challengers to name a few.  

She also noted of the lack of housing options in the community towards many housing requirements, as well as a growing level of homelessness which has risen from 71 to 128 from 2018-2021 

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Towards discussion, Councillor Adey led off the conversation expressing his appreciation for the detailed content of the document and how it will serve to answer many questions that the public has raised on housing over the last few years.

Of note, he highlighted how the plan answers the often raised question in the community as to why it is taking time to develop housing.

"I want to start by expressing how much I appreciate the detailed information that is in this report. I think I've had dozens of conversations with people who've said "well we gotta build more  of these and we've gotta do this and this and this. And how come nobody builds anything of this' 

And having something comprehensive like this, that everybody has access to not just councillors, I think informs that conversation and is going to make our jobs a lot easier as we interface with the public talking about housing which is obviously something that is going to be front and centre over the next few years anyways.

So I deeply appreciate the work that went into this and full compliments to the people involved in it." -- Councillor Nick Adey

Councillor Cunningham also praised the report, he put his focus on the Seniors housing and reinforced the demand that is there and observed that some of the data used may be out of date and how the need for it has only grown from the data referenced in the report.

"It's a great report and it addresses a lot of our needs and I agree with Councillor Adey that it's something that we can put out to the public. I just zoomed in on one aspect of it, Senior Housing ...  

This report was done this year but they're referring to wait lists that were 2015, that was seven years ago. Now if you add up just Cedar Village, Wayne Place, Kootenay Place and Kaien Senior you come up with 93 units.

I made some phone calls today, we have close to 200 people on Senior waiting list in this town alone 

And so you know this report, although it's very thorough and all that,  in some areas it's lacking the right information and I got this information  just by making phone calls today ...

This isn't counting the Seniors who are sitting in houses that want  to get out of them. You know like we have housing stock problems.

If they had places where these Seniors could move into instead of moving out of town, then we would have more houses coming on the market" -- Councillor Barry Cunningham  

Councillor Niesh offered up some personal experience in house building in the community, referencing a comment from councillor Cunningham previous, Mr. Niesh observed of the many challenges found towards construction, returning to a familiar theme of muskeg and how it impacts on development.

"To build big projects it costs money and to get people to build here we need bare land, we need land that is clear of  muskeg and ready to build on, so when you walk in the door or look at that piece of land they can say OK I can build on it" -- Councillor Wade Niesh

Noting of the many incentives the city has offered in the past, the Councillor observed how builders will go where it's easy to make money, noting how in Prince Rupert it is not easy to make money.

He also relayed some of the up front costs required by builders when it comes to getting started in the development of housing in the community. He further observed that to get housing built in Prince Rupert there is a need for bare land, land that is clear of muskeg and ready to build on. 

"So, once again, we can talk about reports, numbers, places to build, incentives, all the stuff that we've talked about for years. 

But the reality is, if you give somebody a piece of land that is a rock to build on, things will get built. 

If you give them a piece of land that is a big mud pit, they're going to go somewhere else. 

And that's what we need to solve our problem in this town,  its that if we can get a rock people will build"   -- Councillor Wade Niesh

A more expansive overview of the conversation around the report is available from our Council Timeline Feature here.

I addition to our link above to the preview of the report, the document is available from the Agenda Package for Monday's Council session starting on page 72.

Ms. Pope also noted that at some point in the future it will be made available through the City website.

You can review Ms. Pope's presentation and the discussion that followed from the City's Video Archive starting at the 42 minute mark. 

More on housing in the Prince Rupert area can be explored through our archive page.

Notes from the Monday Council session can be reviewed here.

A wider overview of past Council discussion topics is available here.