#PLACETOLIVE: Vaughan had only 3 affordable housing applications since 2017

Does the city need an MZO to accelerate need for affordable housing?

Yorkregion.com
Nov. 11, 2020
Dina Al-Shibeeb

This is Part 2 in a two-part series on affordable housing in Vaughan.

Vaughan is a booming city, after all; its projected population is set to increase by up to 30 per cent by 2031.

This is the reason why its councillors are continuously busy approving or rejecting land conversions, or listening to deputants during public hearings expressing their concerns over a new development, seen as unfitting to their “already established” neighbourhood.

However, the city told the Vaughan Citizen that only three development applications for affordable housing have been made since 2017.

There was one development application received in 2018 and two in 2019, the city said.

“The three development applications the city did receive have a total of 483 affordable housing units and are all currently under construction,” the city said.

On Oct. 29, Vaughan considered a request for a Minister’s Zoning Order, which included a 10 per cent affordable housing component for about 300 units. So far, Vaughan council has endorsed the request, but the Ministry of Municipal Affairs and Housing is the final approval authority.

The latest MZO has created debate and made Vaughan councillors inch toward formulating an affordable housing strategy.

Due to the scarcity of affordable housing applications, Vaughan Mayor Maurizio Bevilacqua called the MZO “historical,” as it shows how developers are “willing to put (in) 10 per cent minimum affordable housing.”

Bevilacqua told the Vaughan Citizen that the problem lies “essentially” in the “absence of any real strategy when it comes to the particular senior levels of government.”

“So when it’s not there, you have to be creative, and you have to be innovative,” Bevilacqua said. “And that is the reason why I've been pushing  personally -- individual developers to step up and begin to build 10 per cent affordable.”

He also said the MZO was a “response” to calls for more affordable housing, especially after his luncheon in February, which was attended by almost 800 business, government and community leaders as well as consuls general and trade mission representatives from 12 countries.

MARKET NEED VS. EVERYTHING ELSE

MZOs are creating some controversy. A member of Ford’s Greenbelt Council, Linda Pim, whose sole purpose is to give guidance on protected environmental lands, has recently resigned over the province’s decision to issue an MZO for a development that will destroy a provincially significant wetland in Pickering.

Environmental Defence’s executive director Tim Gray also said that Housing Minister Steve Clark has issued over 33 new MZOs, which is many more than the past government did during their entire 15 years in office.

However, there is an urgent economic need for housing amid the population increase.

Dave Wilkes, president of the Building Industry and Land Development Association (BILD), the largest home builders' association in Canada, welcomed Vaughan’s MZO and defended it as part of the democratic process since it was approved by the city’s councillors, even though they aren’t the final deciders.

“The supply of new homes across the GTA, and including in Vaughan and York Region supply is not keeping up with demand,” said Wilkes.

“So when you look at affordability and the larger picture of the overall cost of housing within the GTA, the key problem is that the population is growing faster than the supply,” he added, explaining why approvals need to be done quicker.

BILD published its Municipal Benchmarking Study in September, prepared by Altus Group.

The study included some of the factors behind the need for affordable housing, which included municipal planning processes, demographic factors, government changes and timelines for gaining approvals for new housing.

“We are sharing the best practices brought forward by that benchmarking report; we continue to look at it,” Wilkes said. “What I would ask of the municipality is (that) they look for efficiencies, and ensure that they are undertaking the reviews that they are required to do so, but they do so in an efficient manner.”

Due to the high demand for housing, Wilkes said municipalities need to ensure that the “lengthy time frames we currently have to approve new housing are short while continuing to respect the need for review.”

The report also found that “population is increasing in each municipality studied, and in most cases, this trend is accompanied by falling average household sizes.”

This is leading to increased housing demand in “two ways.”

“The first effect is through the straightforward addition of net new persons moving into a municipality as part of an expanding population and the second effect of household sizes falling results in needing more residential units at a minimum just to house the existing population,” it said.

MAYOR: BOILS DOWN TO FUNDING

Mayor Bevilacqua, meanwhile, said the hurdle facing affordable housing from a municipal level is the “question of funding” and “getting partners around the table to participate.”

For him, the MZOs were “important in making sure that people are inspired to build that 10 per cent.”

“As mayor, I've always wanted to have a sense of a generational equity that allows people to live in a place where they actually grew up,” he added.

“I will continue to challenge developers to at least meet a 10 per cent affordable housing component into development” for a more “inclusive” city, he added.