Vancouver’s housing targets are a swipe at the province

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Good morning,

After two years with my balcony as a plant graveyard, I finally cleared out the old, dead plants and filled it up with a bunch of new stuff — I’ve got a few tomato plants and a bunch of basil (I know someone who will be making homemade pasta sauce this year!), asparagus, squash and some floral plants. The next addition to my balcony, however, may be a little bit more gross. I’ve had two people recently mention vermicomposting to me, and I am seriously considering it as an option!

In today’s newsletter, we’re talking housing and also housing, with our first story about the city’s housing targets and some notable differences with the provincial housing targets for Vancouver, followed by a story on a policy around transit-oriented development.

Let’s dive in!

— Dustin Godfrey, freelancer

PS - If you find this newsletter valuable, please consider forwarding it to your friends. New to the Lookout? Sign-up for free.

WEATHER

Monday: 21 🌡️ 12 | 🌦️

Tuesday: 24 🌡️ 14 | ⛅️ 

Wednesday: 18 🌡️ 14 | 🌧️

HOUSING

The city’s new housing targets are a swipe at the province

What: The City of Vancouver is updating its internal housing targets for 2024 to 2033, and while it believes it can exceed the five-year targets for nearly every category of housing prescribed by the province, two stand out as falling short of the goals: below-market rentals and three-or-more-bedroom units.

• The below-market rentals fall far shorter than the three-bedroom units, both in the number of units and as a percentage of the total units, according to a city staff report. Where the province calls for 7,894 units out of its total target of 28,900 to be below-market rentals by 2028, the city expects only to reach half of that, at 3,950 units.

It gets worse: Comparing the city’s target and the target set by the province isn’t quite apples and oranges. It’s more like comparing green peppers and red peppers — they’re the same fruit, but at different stages in their life. The city is using housing approvals, whereas the province is using housing completions.

Defining definitions: If the metric is based on what the city can control, then the city’s metric actually makes more sense. As noted in the staff report, all it can do is approve construction of new housing. Cities can’t control the market forces that determine whether approved housing is completed, or how long it takes to complete.

• As reported by Urbanized, recently four condo tower developments in Vancouver were delayed due to numerous reasons, including costs, market conditions and interest rates, examples of factors outside the city’s control.

Taking that into account: Rather than aiming for 28,900 units completed, the city has set a target of 41,500 units approved by 2028. That’s 44% higher than the province’s goal, with city staff noting that the city has approved 45% more units than are completed over the last 10 years.

• That means the city’s below-market shortfall isn’t just half of the province’s target — it’s two-thirds. Where the province is aiming for 27% of all units to be below-market rentals, the city’s target is only 9%.

Defining below-market: The target uses housing-income limits (HILs) set by BC Housing, a measure that says rent shouldn’t exceed 30% of a particular income threshold. That threshold changes by city and is updated each year.

• In Vancouver, the 2023 figures were $58,000 for a one-bedroom, $72,000 for a two-bedroom, $86,000 for a three-bedroom and $107,500 for a unit with four or more bedrooms. That would mean rents at a maximum of $1,450, $1,800, $2,150 and $2,688.

It doesn’t appear that BC Housing has updated the figure for 2024, as a Metro Vancouver slide deck from February this year uses the same figures.

What the city says: The city’s explanation for the shortfall is more of a side-swipe at the provincial and federal governments, noting that the city “has consistently fallen short on its affordability targets, as this is highly dependent on capital and operational funding from senior government and other partners.”

• “The city’s proposed target for rental housing at-or-below-HILs rates is lower than the provincial guideline. It reflects the current funding and economic context and relies more heavily on private developer-owned below-market rental to deliver affordable units,” the staff report notes.

Equity needed: The report estimates reaching that level of affordability for 27% of units in Vancouver’s 10-year targets would require $6 billion in equity. The city said it looked at recent social housing projects and found an equity gap of $175,000 per unit for a project with 30% of units being at or below HIL rates.

• The Co-op Housing Federation of BC also expressed concern with the requirement for 30% of units to be at or below HIL rates, according to the report, as it could be a barrier to “co-ops interested in redevelopment.”

Three-bedroom units: As noted, three-bedroom units also fall short of the targets set by the province. Whereas the province calls for 22% of units to be three or more bedrooms, the city will only aim for 14%, an increase of its past policy of aiming for 10% or more, and just slightly above the 13% typically seen, according to the staff report.

• The city says developers have relayed challenges with meeting higher inclusion rates of three-or-more-bedroom units “in the current context, … especially in rental buildings, due to layout considerations, high construction costs and limited consumer purchasing power.”

Stairwells part of the problem: In a video on why North America “can’t build nice apartments,” YouTuber Uytae Lee gives one potential reason for that: our rules requiring two stairwells for buildings three storeys or higher. The video is more about how the requirement forces buildings to be built larger, than the smaller apartment buildings you may see in Europe.

• But Lee also notes that the need for a hallway connecting the two stairwells cuts the building in half, making it harder to include units with more than one bedroom.

However, BC Housing announced in January this year that it is looking into allowing single stairwells in buildings up to eight storeys — and that could have a positive impact on the ability to meet targets for family-sized units.

Zoom out: Vancouver isn’t the only jurisdiction pushing back against the province, and it may just be the beginning. Burnaby reversed a plan to contribute $6 million to build a new school, explicitly blaming the province’s housing legislation which reduces their ability to fund community services, according to Burnaby Now.

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VANCOUVER NUMBERS

🚗 0: If a city staff recommendation passes city council this week, that's how many parking requirements the city will have in new developments across the city, going well beyond the provincially legislated abolition of parking requirements just for transit-oriented development zones. Well, almost. It would still require accessible parking and visitor parking stalls. [Daily Hive]

🏢4: A weak strata market has led the developers of this many high-rise projects to seek extensions to meeting conditions of rezoning. The conditions include finalizing designs, signing housing agreements and paying fees before the rezoning can go into effect. [Storeys]

HOUSING… AGAIN

City proposes transit-oriented rezoning policy

You can consider this a housing issue of the Lookout because we’re once again looking at housing for our second story — and it’s also coming from a city staff report. This time, city council will be considering a policy around rezoning in transit-oriented development areas.

• As a refresher, the province introduced legislation last fall requiring cities to allow up to 20 storeys within 200 m of a SkyTrain station, up to 12 storeys within 400 metres of a SkyTrain station or 200 m of a bus loop, and up to eight storeys within 800 m of a SkyTrain station or 400 m of a bus loop.

Background: When the provincial government ordered cities to designate transit-oriented areas (TOAs), it did not require cities to pre-zone the properties in those areas to meet the prescribed density.

• In fact, the staff report said the provincial regulations and policy manual the province has developed since the transit-oriented development legislation was passed “do not currently provide sufficient guidance to inform a detailed review of rezoning applications within TOAs.”

“The intent of the rezoning policy is to guide reviews of rezoning enquiries and applications within the 29 TOAs, and to clarify city expectations within and outside of existing plan areas until future planning work can be completed to either amend existing or introduce new policy through area plans,” the staff report says.

What’s in the policy: If a developer wants to utilize the maximum 20-, 12-, or eight-storey allowances, staff propose the city require 100% of the residential floor area to be secure rental housing, including 20% permanently secured as below-market rental, or to “deliver 30% of the residential floor area to the city as ‘turn-key’ social housing.”

• The staff report notes that this is a policy that could help achieve some of the housing targets designated by the province, which are discussed in the top story of this newsletter.

In all TOA tiers, the city is proposing to allow developments of low-rise four- or five-storey market rentals, as well as six-storey rental buildings with 20% below-market rentals. Inclusionary housing requirements, the city said, could reduce speculation on properties in the TOAs.

Other policy pieces: The city is also proposing renters in buildings existing in TOAs be protected under the same protections under the Broadway Plan, and for the city to allow greater density for non-profit-owned seniors housing, 100% social housing and residential or commercial projects “advancing the city’s reconciliation goals” on a case-by-case basis.

NEW JOBS

Find your dream job in Vancouver:

1. Technical Writer at IEM Canada

2. Communications Specialist at Variety - the Children’s Charity of BC

3. Business Writer Coordinator at WorkSafeBC

4. Marketing Coordinator at Boffo Developments Ltd.

5. Floral Events Coordinator at Celsia Florist

THE AGENDA

🚒 Fire crews are working to determine the cause of a fire in an East Van house, which firefighters say appears to have started in the basement and burned up into the building, which appears to have been abandoned. There were no reported injuries. [CityNews]

🏢 Prospective residents of a 231-unit housing project in the Downtown Eastside had glowing reviews for the building following an open house on Saturday, with one person who toured the building saying on social media that it felt “too good to be true.” [Vancouver Sun]

💦 Terminal Avenue in Olympic Village was hit with another road closure between Quebec and Main streets due to sewer main issues Saturday, shortly following another incident nearby on Thursday, when streets were flooded with six to eight inches of wastewater. [CTV]

🚣‍♂️ Dragon boaters say they had a close call in False Creek ahead of the Dragon Boat Festival, with a ferry narrowly missing the 12-metre boat with over two dozen rowers. [Vancouver Sun]

👮‍♀️ Mayor Ken Sim is no longer chair of the police board — instead, the board voted Frank Chong into that position, after the province changed laws that previously made mayors automatically the chair of local police boards. [CBC]

EVENTS

Comedy of Errors | Howard Family Stage | Jul. 2 to Sept. 21 | Shakespeare’s famous comedy is coming to Bard on the Beach starting next week | Tickets starting at $30

Seafood Boil | Straight and Marrow | If you’ve never had a seafood boil, now’s your chance, with a West Coast variety including mussels, clams, corn, shrimp and more | Tickets $58

Deckchair Cinema | Lower Lonsdale Waterfront deck | Jun. 27 to Aug. 29 | Come watch cinema outside on the water, with food and drink | Learn more

Fleurs de Villes Artiste 2024 | VanDusen Botanical Garden | Until Jun. 30 | Floral-themed art installations, floral demonstrations, gardening tips and botanical-inspired culinary talks | Admission $10

Enchanted Evenings Concert Series | Dr. Sun Yat-Sen Classical Chinese Garden | Jun. 28 | This installation celebrates Filipino Heritage Month with performances by Jaenna Cali and Mikey Jose | Tickets $40

Killer Mike | Queen Elizabeth Theatre | Jun. 29 | The Atlanta rapper, entrepreneur, Bernie Sanders whisperer and political advocate comes to Vancouver | Tickets $59

Snoop Dog | Rogers Arena | Tomorrow | Tickets are still available for the artist’s Cali to Canada Tour | Tickets $57

Bard on the Beach | Now until September, various showtimes | Sen̓áḵw / Vanier Park | Catch adaptations of Twelfth Night and Hamlet in the evening this weekend at the much-loved annual Shakespeare fest | Tickets $30

RESTAURANT REVIEW

A different type of pho

Written by Geoff Sharpe

When you think of pho, you don’t think of spice.

Well, this Vietnamese restaurant on Main is doing pho a little differently. And by different, I mean a level of spice that will have you grabbing a third glass of water and wishing you had more tissue to blow your nose.

The dish is Bún Bò Huế, and it’s making me rethink my favourite pho dish. To discover which place is serving up this dish and read my review, subscribe instantly to Vancity Lookout Eats, our restaurant review newsletter — deeply researched, well-written reviews, not clickbait content. This story drops tomorrow morning!

COMMUNITY HIGHLIGHTS

• The sky over False Creek was lit up with 180 drones equipped with LED lights for the city’s first-ever public drone air show Saturday night. [Global]

• The Aurorean is a free publication delivering the most interesting science news directly to your inbox. Try it for free today. [Sponsored]

• Douglas Park, an historic Chinese market garden, is officially No. 94 on the Vancouver Heritage Foundation’s list of Places that Matter. [CityNews]

• If you saw hundreds of people skateboarding around Vancouver on Friday, that’s because it was Go Skate Day, which has spread to become a global phenomenon. [CBC]

• West Broadway was taken over by Greek culture yesterday for the 50th annual Greek Day. [Vancouver Sun]

• On May 29, 1928, Bert Love opened Love’s Seaside Gardens, “an ideal place to spend the day or evening,” in the Spanish Banks area — at that time, it was “pretty much out in the boonies,” notes the author of this article. [Vancouver Sun]

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PHOTO OF THE DAY

Police clear out sunset viewers at a public beach, something the poster said has become a common occurrence.

GOOD NEWS

Start your day off with some good news:

An old Vancouver band released a 54-year-old album. The band was called Canada, but also it was called The Fox, but now on the album it’s called Canada-Fox, and the album is self-titled, so the album is Canada-Fox by Canada-Fox, also known as Canada, also known as The Fox. Oh, and one of the band’s alumni is Loverboy guitarist Paul Dean. [CBC]

QUIZ

Here’s today’s news quiz — what would it take for a developer to use the maximum density in the transit-oriented areas? Reply with your name and answer to be featured in the newsletter.