Affordable housing shortage hurts Toronto: Mayor Tory

Mayors of big Canadian cities are vowing to keep the pressure on parties for help on affordable and social housing

Thestar.com
Sept. 24, 2015
By David Rider

Toronto’s affordable housing shortage is threatening employers’ ability to attract workers, Mayor John Tory said Thursday, demanding that federal parties offer solutions before the Oct. 19 election.

Tory’s comments came after strategizing with counterparts from Vancouver, Edmonton, Halifax, London and Kitchener on how to get affordable and social housing on the campaign radar.

Almost every day, Tory said, businesspeople warn that the costs of shelter - the average detached Toronto house was priced at more than $1 million last month - along with transit challenges are making it harder to recruit and keep staff.

“Businesses are figuring out that this is not sustainable,” Tory told reporters after the mayors’ meeting.

“This will become more and more of a competitive disadvantage and a problem for jobs, if it’s allowed to continue.”

The mayors’ voices are being heard like never before. They made note of the major promises parties have made on transit and infrastructure funding since the Federation of Canadian Municipalities gathering in February.

But they are not satisfied with how the federal parties have dealt so far with issues such as helping municipalities combat homelessness, providing or supporting subsidized housing for lowest-income residents, or incentives to the private sector to build housing for people with working-class incomes.

“It’s basically been forgotten in the election to date,” said Vancouver Mayor Gregor Robertson, chair of FCM’s big city mayors’ caucus.

Edmonton Mayor Don Iveson said the three major parties have promised parts of his wish list - creation of new social housing units, rental market stimulus, use of federal lands, commitment to renew and expand $1.7 billion worth of expiring CMHC mortgages, and a “Housing First” homelessness strategy.

“I feel like Goldilocks right now, except all three bowls of porridge are cold,” he said. “If (only) somebody can step forward and heat it up to ‘just right.’ They’ve got about a month to convince the mayors and Canadians that they get it.”

On its www.citiescan.ca website, FCM compares parties’ housing promises and more. On Thursday, however, the mayors weren’t prepared to say if they will use their newfound power to tell voters which parties have the best policies.

“We’re not going to shy away from making sure that voters understand how important housing is and which parties are making serious commitments,” is all Vancouver’s Robertson would say.

The mayors also talked about co-ordinating efforts to help resettle Syrian refugees.

Tory and Iveson met separately to talk about their cities’ efforts to deal with Uber, which Iveson says operates in a “grey market” in Edmonton.

Last week, Toronto’s licensing committee rejected city staff recommendations to open the door to UberX, an app that connects riders to drivers using personal vehicles.

Tory told reporters he is hopeful that next week, full council will restore the recommendation and “recognize that that’s the right path to go - regulate Uber for the first time and to bring more equitable regulations to the taxi industry, to drivers who are struggling.”

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