Federal housing plan not the 'immediate, urgent response' needed, says researcher
CBC
Canada needs to move more quickly in response to the housing crisis, says housing researcher Steve Pomeroy.
Pomeroy, a senior research fellow for the Centre for Urban Research and Education at Carleton University and a member of the Canadian Housing Evidence Collaborative, was responding to Finance Minister Chrystia Freeland's fall economic statement, in which she laid out measures accelerating housing construction.
"In a crisis you need an immediate, urgent response," said Pomeroy.
He described Freeland's plan as "$15 billion for new construction and another billion for affordable housing, but that money's not going to flow until 2025. And then it takes two or three years at least for units to be built. So they're basically coming up with a solution that creates a solution four years from now for a problem that exists today."
Pomeroy's research uncovered a massive change in P.E.I.'s rental market from 2011 to 2021.
Combing through census data for affordable rental units, defined as costing under $750 a month, Pomeroy found 3,150 of those apartments disappeared in the decade between the two censuses.
Over that timespan, only 73 affordable units were built.
A quicker solution for people desperate to afford housing, Pomeroy suggested, would be direct assistance.
"If you really wanted to help people in the short term, [add] things like the Canada Housing Benefit, which gives people a few hundred dollars a month to help them manage their rents," he said.
In an interview with Island Morning on Wednesday, Freeland rejected the notion that the government is moving too slowly.
"I absolutely understand that housing is an urgent priority on P.E.I.," the federal finance minister said. "The new measures that we announced yesterday are going to make a difference right away."
The new money is for existing programs, she said, programs that are getting housing built on P.E.I. right now, and that increase in supply is essential with the Island's rapidly growing population.
Pomeroy was more positive about an announced plan to crack down on short-term rentals, with the goal of seeing more of those accommodations converted into rented homes.
The initiative would prevent short-term rental owners from claiming expenses on income tax unless they were officially registered and working inside the rules of their municipal jurisdiction.