Metro Vancouver’s housing market high priority as BC legislature convenes for summer session
Posted July 25, 2016 7:07 am.
This article is more than 5 years old.
VANCOUVER (NEWS 1130) – Our crazy housing situation is the priority as provincial lawmakers gather in Victoria for a summer session.
Specifically, the government plans to give the City of Vancouver the power to implement a vacancy tax by modifying its charter.
“We don’t do summer sessions that often,” says Premier Christy Clark. “Only when there’s an urgent issue to deal with, and housing is an urgent issue in BC. We’ve got to get this dealt with.”
If there is a solution to improving housing affordability, it can’t just be a provincial one, says Clark, who says all levels of government need to do their part.
“Just from the BC government, there’s more that we need to do,” says Clark. “Then, from the federal government perspective, obviously, I’ve talked about some of the things that they need to do. And municipal governments need to look hard at the 125,000 units that are languishing in approvals in their planning departments.”
The province has come in for heavy criticism in some quarters in recent months as detached house prices have seen annual price increases of 30 per cent, and as the rental vacancy rate in the city of Vancouver sits at less than one per cent.
Until calling this summer session, Clark’s government had expressed a reluctance to interfere with the free market.
