City will consider public land inventory after push from housing advocates

CONNOR LUCZKA, Local Journalism Initiative Reporter

According to members of the Stratford Affordable Housing Alliance (SAHA), a public City of Stratford land inventory and a land bank (land specifically designated for future sale and development) are critical to tackling the housing crisis in the Festival City and beyond.

On June 26, representatives from SAHA said as much when they petitioned the heritage and planning subcommittee to create and publish those lists, as well as to have equity and inclusion at the core of the 10-year housing and homelessness plan’s renewal, to explore community land trusts as an answer to the affordability crisis and to “preserve the city’s equity-focused definition of affordability.”

After a discussion between staff, subcommittee members and delegates, the advocates got at least part of their wish. The subcommittee passed a motion to investigate the publishing of a publicly accessible inventory of municipal land and the possible creation of a land bank for affordable and mixed-income housing.

"We recognize that the city’s finances are currently tight and that the planning department is understaffed,” Niki Andre, co-founder and director of SAHA, said in a subsequent media release. “That being said, as city staff begin the process of renewing our 10-year housing and homelessness plan and finalizing our Official Plan, the delivery of a public inventory of land and property – and the creation of a land bank – is not only timely, but critical. These steps lay the essential groundwork that enables community organizations to plan, fundraise and form alliances to activate future affordable housing developments."

Adam Betteridge, interim chief administrative officer (CAO), said during the discussion that a public inventory was certainly possible. There is currently one individual that maps the city’s land and has not posted the list due to not being given that direction. He warned the subcommittee and public, however, that the list of parcels is so small, with much of the land not being serviceable and not being developable, that city-owned land is not the silver bullet answer to the housing crisis.

“It's often construed that the city does own a lot of lands, but they’re lands meant for specific purposes other than development,” Betteridge said. “Can a list be done? Yes. Is our staff working towards putting that list together, but that includes the data that needs to be associated with it. How big is it? When was it acquired? Is it serviced? Is it zoned? Is it in a location outside of a flood or control flood plain control or regulated area, those sorts of things. So we are working on that, but that's amongst other priorities that we're working on as well.”

During her delegation, Andre also criticized council’s decision to enter into negotiations with Pol Quality Homes Inc., a for-profit development company, to develop two parcels of as of now city-owned land. She criticized the tender-award process for not publishing the matrix used to judge bids and the developer’s housing plans themselves. Pol aims to build a combined 27 housing units on the parcels, including eight affordable units.

“Affordable to whom remains unclear, as the city's Official Plan is still under review and its definition of affordability is being revised,” Andre said. “… Pol's successful bid includes just six to eight affordable units out of 27, so about a third. In contrast, United Housing's mixed income model typically aims for 50 per cent, so they likely proposed 13 to 15 affordable homes in their bid. Home Sweet Home’s proposal was also for 15 fully affordable tiny homes. Had these not-for-profit proponents been awarded land, would Stratford soon have around 30 more truly affordable homes, most, if not all, offered to people on the homeless and (Rent-Geared-to-Income) list and kept affordable indefinitely through not-for-profit or city management? What is going on? How and why did this happen?”

Coun. Lesley Biehn, later in the discussion, clarified that the reason why Pol was selected was because they were the only bidder with funding. While many proponents presented ideas, Pol presented a plan. Furthermore, the land transfer currently being negotiated is a way to address the housing crisis without burdening the tax base.

“The way that I'm seeing it is that this is an opportunity for us to add to our affordable housing stock, where … it's not driving up taxes to do so,” Biehn said.

Betteridge said that the process was followed per the city’s procurement process “to achieve housing options on those parcels of land that would be in the public interest.” He suggested that a follow-up report on the method of tender-awarding could be provided at a subsequent meeting.

The city, through investStratford, is currently in negation with Pol. If an agreement is reached in the 90 day period, it will be presented to council for final approval at a later council meeting.