File photo (Image credit: CFJC Today).

By Susie Chant, MLA for North Vancouver-Seymour

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SOUND OFF: BC Builds helps bring more housing to British Columbians

Feb 21, 2024 | 10:30 AM

I HEAR ALL THE TIME in my office about how too many rental homes are out of reach for people, even if they make a decent, middle-class wage, and how people are feeling forced to spend more than half of their income on housing alone. Global inflation, high interest rates, rising construction costs and their effect on the housing market are pushing people out of their communities and making labour shortages worse across B.C.

That’s why through BC Builds, we’re taking action to deliver more housing for middle-income people in our communities, faster.

This means soon more working professionals like teachers, nurses, and construction workers who are incredibly important members of our communities, will be able to find rentals in the places they love and want to live in B.C.

We know this is a challenging time, and that’s exactly why BC Builds was created – to provide resilience in a difficult market and help combat challenges that might put housing out of reach for some people. By bringing down construction costs through grants, leveraging government, community, and non-profit owned and underused land, and working to speed up timelines, BC Builds projects delivered through BC Housing will help get more housing projects for middle-income renters off the ground and built faster.

Our government’s $2 billion investment into BC Builds, with an additional $950 million, will help ensure that we build homes for middle class workers who we love in our communities, who may be our friends and family members, so they can continue to be our neighbours. We also know that if people are able to spend less on rent each month that means they will have more money to cover other expenses and save for the future.

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We know that solving the housing crisis requires all levels of government, and just this week Prime Minister Trudeau announced that the Federal government would also be contributing $2 billion to BC Builds to help build even more homes for people.

For projects in partnership with non-profits and First Nations, a minimum of 20% of units will be required to rent at 20% below market rate, and all remaining units will have a target of making sure people in middle- income households are spending no more than 30% of their income on rent.

There are more than 20 initial BC Builds sites that have been identified on government, First Nation, non-profit and community owned land and BC Builds will be continuing to seek out additional landowners who may want to build housing for the community on their underused land or above new community infrastructure.

This includes in my own community of North Vancouver, which will create an 18-storey mass timber building that will include 180 units affordable for middle-income households. Many other municipalities and partners are working with BC Builds to bring more affordable middle-income homes to their communities.

BC Builds is designed to grow, and this is just the beginning.

We know housing is a concern for all British Columbians, and this is only one piece of our Homes for People plan, designed to make sure we’re getting more people into homes they can afford, faster.

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Editor’s Note: This opinion piece reflects the views of its author, and does not necessarily represent the views of CFJC Today or Pattison Media.