Seniors 'have to move out' of unaffordable York Region, minister told

Yorkregion.com
Feb. 21, 2017
By Lisa Queen

With the average price of a house in York Region hovering around $1 million, the lack of affordable housing isn’t only chasing young people starting out and middle-aged residents from the region, a roundtable meeting on issues facing seniors was told.

“There are many seniors that are on a fixed income that are finding it difficult to find (a place to live) and are having to move out of the region because they can’t find affordable housing,” Jim Abram, vice-president of the Aurora Seniors’ Association, said.

Ontario’s minister of seniors’ affairs, Dipika Damerla, and Newmarket-Aurora MPP Chris Ballard, minister of housing and minister responsible for the province’s poverty reduction strategy, were at the Newmarket Senior’s Meeting Place Feb. 17, to hear from representatives of seniors’ groups, including Community and Home Assistance to Seniors (CHATS), the Alzheimer Society of York Region and Loft Community Services, about housing, recreation incentives, the role of volunteers and even if the name “seniors” is outdated.

While governments must tackle the challenge of affordable housing, it’s important not to introduce measures that would financially hurt seniors who are homeowners relying on the equity in their homes to fund their nest eggs, Ballard said.

“We all marvel and sometimes gasp day by day as we see what houses are selling for in our communities and on our streets,” he said. “Government has to be very, very careful that whatever it does to make housing affordable, it doesn’t do it at the risk of greatly diminishing the value of seniors’ greatest asset.”

But that didn’t bring much comfort to Abram.

“There are so many seniors that don’t have that asset. That’s where my concern is,” he said.

Residents unable to afford housing are paying the price of too many residents being opposed to accepting affordable and rental housing into their communities when the issue was first raised as a red flag a quarter century ago, Ballard said.

The province has introduced measures to increase affordable housing, including giving municipalities additional tools, such as the ability to require developers to include lower cost units in new developments, and requiring municipalities to establish bylaws allowing secondary suites, he said.