Salt Spring officials are standing together to back a 50-unit affordable housing project, promising support and funding to quickly shepherd the proposal towards a critical BC Housing construction grant application.
The project would be built at 154 Kings Lane, and the island’s Local Trust Committee (LTC) voted to expedite a rezoning of the parcel, asking staff to prioritize the application as well as any others associated with the project.
The new proposal is built upon a shelved 50-unit senior independent living project once planned by the Gulf Islands Senior Residence Association (GISRA), which owns the property.
At the site now are the Salt Spring Island Health Centre and BC Housing’s temporary supportive housing modular units, the latter awaiting decommissioning once residents shift to the nearly-complete Drake Road building.
GISRA vice chair Linda Adams presented an update to the LTC Thursday, June 5 on the association’s application, which seeks to amend the current seniors-focused zoning to allow affordable housing more generally.
Adams explained GISRA, which operates Meadowbrook’s independent living residences, had originally acquired the parcel intending to build another, similar seniors’ housing complex, and the LTC rezoned it in 2020 to allow 50 such units — alongside the medical clinic use, with a maximum of 12 medical practitioners.
But with the benefit of the passage of time — and, Adams said, a great deal of community consultation and research — GISRA concluded the seniors’ housing model wasn’t viable, largely due to rising construction costs and limited demand.
“At the same time, we all know that the need for affordable rental housing — or sometimes referred to as workforce housing — is urgent in our community,” said Adams. “So housing for young families, healthcare workers and other essential service employees.”
GISRA’s rezoning application also seeks to lift the limit on the number of doctors permitted at the extant clinic, and to allow partitioning of the property.
Adams said GISRA over the long term will probably want to “subdivide off” the clinic portion and retain the residential side — another measure, she said, intended to help the housing project financially.
“The overall goal is to improve primary care services, increase the number of spaces available for doctors and therefore improve healthcare for islanders,” said Adams. “We think that this property is a key asset, one that accommodates badly needed workforce housing while helping to address the doctor shortage — so sort of addressing two major issues on Salt Spring Island.”
Salt Spring’s elected Local Community Commission had earlier voted unanimously to provide a grant-in-aid to GISRA to help fund pre-development due diligence; now, commission member and Capital Regional District (CRD) Director Gary Holman said in a letter of support he had informed CRD staff he was prepared to support a Community Works Fund grant of up to $400,000 to support the extension of the Ganges sewer line to the property, which lies within the sewer district.
“This project represents Salt Spring’s best opportunity to develop new affordable housing that can serve a range of needs,” wrote Holman, who had penned a letter to the LTC expressing support for the project.
But local trustees clearly needed little encouragement, voting unanimously in favour of expediting their part of the process. Islands Trust staff told local trustees that while the application was complex, they believed they had the resources to move it through swiftly; that speed, Adams said, would only help the project’s likelihood of success
“Our understanding is that there’s a provincial pool of funding, and the first ones in the door are perhaps the ones most likely to be able to get some of that funding,” said Adams, laying out details of a particularly relevant call for proposals from BC Housing with applications due by the end of July.
“We believe this property represents Salt Spring’s best opportunity to develop additional, affordable workforce housing — and it’s in a prime location,” said Adams.
“This one is important; we need housing, and I agree this project is well positioned,” said trustee Laura Patrick, noting she no longer had a doctor on-island herself.
“This opportunity in this funding stream is the best fit to this project — and I’m wishing them the best of luck to make it.”
Regarding the proposed 50-unit affordable housing project on Kings Lane.
My husband & I live on Kings Lane & we are nothing but happy to read of this happening as well as the increased lifting of the limit of doctors allowed. We can’t think of anything we need more of on this island than affordable housing & doctors.
Tom & Linda James