Motion B.2 on Dec 6th, 2022 Introduces Barriers to Democracy while Perpetuating No Definition of Social Housing
Will an ABC majority yield to Councillor Boyle’s pressure tactics?
You can write to Council or sign up to speak at the Council meeting where Motion B.2 - Reducing Barriers and Deepening Affordability for Non-Profit, Co-op and Social Housing in Every Neighbourhood will be considered before December 6th, 2022.
There is a lot wrong with Councillor Boyle’s motion, written in the language of "done deals" and how it is presented.
Timing. The motion is presented before two major religious holidays, when citizens are busy with preparations. A similar motion was passed in Victoria by the previous Council right before three major religious holidays earlier this year. This approach betrays the oath just sworn in on November 7th to represent all people of Vancouver in good faith.
Self-serving. It is ironic that a Councillor who thinks public hearings are too long and expensive heavily promotes her own email generator and has already recruited a speakers list to support her attempt to remove the democratic right to consultation without even consulting unsuspecting citizens. Following this approach undermines Cllr. Boyle’s own argument, but helps her and her party rig an established City process and build a mailing list for her own purposes.
Illegitimate. A small front group like Women Transforming Cities, aligned with Cllr. Boyle’s own party One City, does not have more legitimacy in determining city policy than the rest of the residents in Vancouver.
Does not address lack of funding. From a recent Vancouver Sun article, Thom Armstrong stated that 2400 social/ co-op housing projects were funded out of 13,000 applications.
Three co-op housing projects remain unfunded after 5 years of waiting, including a building for 76 homes at 177 West Pender St for women with and without families fleeing violent relationships.
This could have been well-suited for West 8th and Arbutus site, an area with a school, families and church with a social justice section, but this type of project is not a priority for BC Housing.
Ignores the lack of governance and financial mismanagement at BC Housing.
From a Sep 20th, 2022 article in Daily Hive, a Temporary Modular Home TMH project with 40 units in Richmond cost $9.5 million to build, yet a steel modular building for 129 people tentatively costs $64 million to build in Kitsilano.
So, the Richmond project costs $237,500 per unit and the Vancouver one costs $496,000.
Does steel and concrete add $250K to a unit cost, or is there something else going on?
Ignores the creation of a new Ministry of Housing. Cities and regions should be negotiating a new deal with the province to get direct funding for housing, one with more equitable distribution and better governance over who receives funds and how they are used, without unnecessary bureaucracy and fewer delays.
The spirit of competition and innovation amongst different communities can improve the affordability of housing.
Mayor Ken Sim, with his knowledge of business and forensic accounting, said that he would manage Vancouver like a business, and that he was looking forward to speaking with his MLA, David Eby.
So, let Mayor Sim negotiate without being encumbered by this motion.
Avoids public disclosure of relevant information. This motion is a thinly veiled attack on the discoveries revealed by the public hearing for the West 8th and Arbutus project.
In item 15 of Councillor Boyle's motion:
In response, City legal and planning staff outlined that significant amendments at the Public Hearing stage are not ideal, and that if Council wanted to be more ambitious in this regard, a preferable route would be through a separate Council motion.
Motion B.2 attempts to move any opportunity of public input well beyond the point in the process where meaningful changes are possible. It also seeks to diminish the nature of these changes.
No, it isn't ideal for City legal and planning staff to reveal that they hide information, including the right to ask specific operations questions to BC Housing and MPA while they are in Council Chambers, the actual content of the Memorandum of Understanding (MOU), and false threats that funding would go away if the project was changed.
Not ideal at all when Councilor Kirby-Yung asks tough and embarrassing questions of City legal and planning staff at a public hearing. Refer to her contributions to the public hearing for West 8th at Arbutus
The same Councilor Kirby-Yung introduced and passed a motion on Dec 19, 2018, ‘Improving Resident Participation at City Council (pages 4-5):
Hearing from residents of Vancouver and providing residents the opportunity to speak to City Council on civic matters is an important and fundamental aspect of our democratic process.
Council has a responsibility to maximize the ability for residents to participate in their local civic government and to reduce barriers.
Item 15 also deprecates substantial amendments like the ones introduced by Councillors Dominato, Carr and Bligh to the project on West 8th at Arbutus. The amendments should have been made before the hearing; however, without Councillors having spoken directly to the public, they wouldn't have realized that problems existed. Item 15 eliminates this opportunity.
The MOU obtained by Kitsilano Coalition through a Freedom of Information, proved the Councillors CORRECT.
Supportive care services needed to be defined, because the MOU doesn't stipulate them (page 4):
BC Housing will provide funding for support services appropriate for a tenant population that has experienced or has been at risk of homelessness. These supports will include a 24/7 staffing model, a meal program and non-clinical supports.
Wrap-around service to be delivered through coordinated neighborhood health services (which don’t exist) with dedicated workers in the clinics who will prioritize referrals from the Developments.
The MOU proved the opponents of the project RIGHT. It wasn't 50-50 shelter rate-low income rate; it was pretty much all shelter rate, but it did not specifically exclude couples and families.
Tenants living in studio units in each building will come primarily from unsheltered locations (approximately 50%), from shelters (approximately 30%), and from other tenancies including transfers from other buildings, SRO's, hospital transfers, etc. (approximately 20%).
The MOU did not specify this particular site. It didn’t require a specific unit number. It did not exclude mixed funding models inside the same building, as proposed by Councilor Bligh, which, in my opinion, is the way of the future.
Even BC Housing is proposing mixed funding models and housing types within one building in Victoria, showing that a public hearing could effect CHANGE on BC Housing.
The other remarkable part of the West 8th and Arbutus hearing is how LOATHE city staff is to talking to residents of Vancouver. Planners weren't aware of the elementary school, toddler park, Sancta Maria House, seniors housing or low income housing in the area.
Managing Director Celine Mauboules kept talking about helping the operator MPA deal with Sancta Maria House, but didn't want to talk to Sancta Maria House herself.
City planners could not possibly see the opportunity to amplify a housing project by working with what's already in the area, like a school, families and an abstinence-based recovery house.
Eliminates public input through intentionally deceitful processes. Item 12 from Motion B.2 proposes consultation at the Development Permit stage. Actually, at DP stage the option to oppose the project does not exist anymore. It is a Done Deal.
12. Major redevelopments still include opportunities for public engagement. Even when they don’t require a public hearing, the Development Permit process includes public notification and opportunities for comment, and could still require a Development Permit Hearing process, providing residents an opportunity to address the Development Permit Board in a public meeting;
Avoids responsibility of Council by delegating to unelected staff. Cllr. Boyle's final point further excludes the public, and especially the end user who actually lives in SOCIAL HOUSING.
C. THAT Council direct staff to engage with the community housing sector on clarifications or changes related to the city’s definition of social housing in order to strengthen public understanding and trust, without creating barriers to developing community housing at break-even rents with no funding from senior levels of government.
The ABC Majority Council should reject Cllr. Boyle's manipulative motion. Adopting this motion only further weakens the citizens’ trust in City Hall.
ABC ran a campaign about communicating with the public, making the city safer, and correcting the errors of the past 12 years.
BE IT RESOLVED:
That the ABC Majority Council reject Councilor Boyle's motion.
That the ABC Majority Council use public input into what the definition of social housing is.
That the ABC Majority Council use evidence-based research on the best model for Supportive Housing and perform this properly as part of the enhanced safety plan for the City.
That the ABC Majority Council define its own priorities for housing and negotiate directly with the provincial government on how this can happen.
And finally, that the ABC Majority Council reorganizes the city planners to be one department for housing for all, instead of three different silos that don't communicate with the the residents of Vancouver.
A logical way to do this is to spread the planners into offices in the different neighbourhoods of Vancouver where they are obligated to speak to the residents, learn what the strengths and weaknesses are, and form alliances with the neighbourhoods.
This is the route to societal cohesion, which Vancouver desperately needs to be a safe, productive and inviting city.
You can write to Council or sign up to speak at the Council meeting where Motion B.2 - Reducing Barriers and Deepening Affordability for Non-Profit, Co-op and Social Housing in Every Neighbourhood will be considered before December 6th, 2022.
This is the best written explanation of why Motion B.2 must be defeated or civic democracy is lost