Housing & homelessness

Investment needed for dedicated affordable housing

Jan 21, 2019
This post is part of our BC Budget 2019 series, which highlights key findings from the CCPA’s research and outlines our recommendations for the 2019 provincial budget. Find more from the series at: policynote.ca/budget2019 The 2018 BC Budget took some major new steps towards housing affordability, in particular on the taxation side with new progressive… View Article

Our BC Budget 2019 priorities: Poverty reduction and climate action

Jan 8, 2019
In anticipation of the 2019 BC Budget—which the provincial government will present in February—the CCPA-BC is publishing a series of Policy Note posts highlighting the recommendations from our submission to the Budget Consultations. Those recommendations include ideas for improving BC’s health care, education, transit, child care and much more. Today, I kick off the series… View Article

Housing platforms and platitudes in the 2018 Vancouver election

Oct 11, 2018
It should be no surprise that Vancouver’s growing housing affordability crisis is the top issue going into the election. All candidates are in favour of affordable housing, of course. Sorting out the chatter from concrete plans, however, can be difficult—not least because of the way Vancouver’s municipal politics has fractured going into the election, with… View Article

Land wealth is a massive source of inequality in BC

Sep 4, 2018
Many of us worry about income inequality in BC, and so we should. But here’s the thing—bad as income inequality is, wealth inequality is worse. And in our province, that wealth inequality is driven in large part by real estate—who owns it, and who doesn’t. The ownership of real estate wealth in BC is highly… View Article

Urgent action needed to control rent increases: Submission to the BC Rental Housing Task Force

Jul 6, 2018
On July 3rd, we shared our recommendations regarding BC’s Residential Tenancy Act and controlling rental costs in British Columbia with the BC Rental Housing Task Force. This is our submission. As we noted in our March submission to the BC government’s poverty reduction consultation, we believe that bold action to control rental costs must be… View Article

Low property taxes help fuel housing crisis

Jun 4, 2018
In the wake of February’s BC Budget, property taxes have been making headlines. But less attention has been paid to the province’s unusually low property tax rates, particularly in Vancouver, and how they help fuel the housing crisis. The city of Vancouver has among the lowest property tax rates in the country. Even the additional… View Article

From housing market to human right: A view from Metro Vancouver

May 29, 2018
I made the following submission to the Government of Canada’s consultation on National Housing Strategy’s human rights-based approach to housing, through which they are requesting “opinions and ideas about the key elements of a human rights-based approach to housing, the proposed approach to the new legislation, and new concepts to be explored.” This submission outlines key reasons… View Article