Port Moody all for affordable housing, but wants GVRD support, resources

By Angela MacKenzie - Staff Reporter

Port Moody council will include the issue of affordable housing in its plans for the city's growth, but at last week's council meeting voiced concerns over affordable-housing targets for the city set by the Greater Vancouver Regional District (GVRD).

The process of reviewing the city's official community plan (OCP) began last year, and the city hopes to complete the OCP update in 2008.

The OCP is a council-approved document that describes the vision of the city's future over the next 20 years. The city is required to update its OCP every five years under the Local Government Act.

"In terms of the official community plan, I can't think of a meeting over the last four months when we haven't talked about affordable housing in one respect or another. Having a tool enshrined in our OCP is going to make it that much easier for us to focus our efforts on address this issue, so I'm very, very supportive of that," Coun. Diana Dilworth said, adding that the process should include consulting with residents about the issue.

Council, however, voted to forward concerns to the GVRD about a Jan. 17 regional affordable housing discussion paper sent to the city for review.

The city wants the GVRD to provide municipalities with adequate support and resources to encourage the development of affordable housing if local affordable housing targets are included in the final GVRD affordable housing strategy.

"I get leery of things where I see the city taking on the role of another level of government that seems to be giving up its role," Coun. Mike Clay said.

Clay noted that city staff report that the number of tenants in the city paying more than 30 per cent of household income on gross rent was 30 per cent, compared to the GVRD at 43 per cent, Coquitlam at 41 per cent and Port Coquitlam at 44 per cent.

"So it tells me that people should be coming to Port Moody to find out what we're already doing," Clay said.

Describing the housing report as including "the good, the bad and the ugly," Dilworth said she is also leery about directives for housing-level quotas the city would be required to meet and hopes the city speaking up about its concerns will begin a conversation on the issue.

Mayor Joe Trasolini, who sat on the GVRD housing committee, said the concept of having the GVRD look after affordable-housing properties is a sound one, but added that funding and subsidies from the federal and provincial governments are crucial.

"I am in favour of the fact that we are talking," Trasolini said. "If this gets the municipalities and the GVRD talking about what the needs are and where we have to go and the whole funding issue, then we're getting there."

published on 01/31/2007