Housing initiatives presented in the federal budget take a page from BC

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The federal budget, presented Tuesday, made a big shift on housing, and analysts say many of the initiatives are borrowed from Prime Minister David Eby’s housing agenda.

One of the initiatives, the Canada Rent Protection Fund, was announced by Prime Minister Justin Trudeau in the run-up to the budget and will use $1.5 billion in federal money to help non-profit organizations purchase rental units throughout the country and ensure that they remain. affordable.

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The program is almost a carbon copy of Eby’s $500 million rent protection fund, which was announced in January 2023 and was a key element of Eby’s housing platform in the BC NDP leadership campaign. .

The federal Liberals also released the Canada Builds plan, which calls for underutilized federal lands, including Canada Post and National Defense properties, to achieve the goal of building 3.87 million new homes by 2031.

In February, Eby unveiled his long-awaited BC Builds plan, which will use $2 billion of low-cost government financing to accelerate the construction of rental buildings on underutilized public, private or nonprofit land. Eby estimated it could create at least 4,000 affordable units for middle-income British Columbians.

“I will give credit where credit is due. In fact, we have modeled Canada Builds after the BC Builds program,” said federal Liberal cabinet minister Jonathan Wilkinson, speaking to Postmedia News on Friday ahead of federal budget day. Wilkinson oversees the energy and natural resources file, but has been involved in many of the Trudeau government’s pre-budget announcements to implement the national housing strategy.

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“We thought there were a number of elements in BC Builds that were actually very useful, so we essentially took what Premier Eby has done and looked to use it across the country,” Wilkinson said. “The Eby government has been very committed to the issue of housing. They have been very collaborative in all the conversations we have had with them and, in fact, we have copied some of the programs they have implemented.”

Andy Yan, an urban planner and director of the Cities Program at Simon Fraser University, said the federal budget is clearly influenced by Eby’s “bold” housing platform.

“It really is one of those things that doesn’t repeat itself but rhymes,” he said, comparing Trudeau’s real estate strategy to Eby’s.

It raises the question, Yan said, of whether BC will get a “first-mover advantage” in the form of greater financial support for the housing initiatives that have been spearheaded in BC while other provinces are still playing catch-up.

The challenge for both the BC government and the federal government, Yan said, is how long it will take for housing projects to move from policy announcement to physical reality, which is key to addressing the housing crisis.

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Tom Davidoff, executive director of the Center for Urban Economics and Real Estate at UBC’s Sauder School of Business, said it’s notable that the federal government is topping up the Housing Accelerator Fund with $400 million, what he called “stick-and-roll financing.” the carrot” that rewards cities. to indigenous peoples and governments cash for housing, as long as they accept zoning reforms and higher density housing.

Since the $4 billion fund was announced in 2022, 15 British Columbia communities have received funding. This is out of 179 housing agreements signed with communities across Canada.

“I think (the fund) has really influenced municipal zoning across Canada, which is pretty important,” Davidoff said.

Davidoff said the Housing Accelerator Fund uses a similar approach to the Eby Housing Supply Act, which also takes a carrot-and-stick approach by rewarding municipalities with cash for services if they meet provincially set targets. for the construction of new homes.

Wilkinson said B.C. municipalities that were able to get that federal funding is due in part to the fact that “they were moving down that path thanks to the work of the B.C. government.”

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Eby said the BC NDP government already achieved the zoning reform Ottawa was demanding through a law passed last fall requiring municipalities to approve up to six units on a single-family lot.

“British Columbia is already where (the federal government) wants the provinces to be,” Eby said, speaking about federal housing money during an unrelated news conference Tuesday morning. “We are willing to accept all money from other provinces that refuse to take the basic steps to ensure housing availability.”

Eby said he “welcomes the federal government coming to the table in a meaningful way on housing,” which he added is “overdue.”

with files from The Canadian Press

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