Salt Spring’s land use officials delivered on early statements of support for a healthcare workforce housing effort, quickly lending its approval to the Lady Minto Hospital Foundation’s (LMHF) re-zoning application for 101 Bittancourt Rd.
The island’s Local Trust Committee (LTC) gave the nod to the 18-unit redevelopment project at their meeting Thursday, Feb. 13, a somewhat expected outcome despite emerging staff concerns –– including that the project lacked an affordable housing agreement secured on the property’s title, as required by the Salt Spring Island Official Community Plan (OCP).
But trustees –– who have expressed consistent support for the foundation’s plans –– exercised their wide discretion, resolving that the project was not contrary to or at variance with the OCP or the Islands Trust’s Policy Statement, reading the bylaw approving the zoning change three times and asking staff to forward the project to the Islands Trust’s Executive Committee (EC). Trustee Jamie Harris said he felt rezoning the parcel was in line with the intentions of the OCP, if not the letter.
“And not to mention that we are in a [housing] crisis,” said Harris, “and have been in a crisis situation for a very long time.”
Trustee Laura Patrick agreed, lamenting that “affordable healthcare housing” isn’t defined in the OCP despite a need for healthcare workers who “still can’t afford to find a place to live.”
“The OCP has had good intent trying to focus on affordable housing, but our own definitions put us into a corner that I do not believe was intended,” said Patrick. “The project needs to proceed at this [accelerated] timeline; if we risk this project, we face real harm to the community.”
LMHF board chair Julian Clark said the project would indeed fall apart under the suggested housing agreement, which in part would mandate rents stay below 30 per cent of the area’s median income –– some $38,000 per year on Salt Spring, he said, according to Statistics Canada.
“To be frank, we can’t rent these units out at 30 per cent of $38,000 and make this economically feasible,” said Clark. “It will kill the project.”
Trustees had asked staff in December to prioritize the application to convert the former motel into housing for healthcare workers after LMHF indicated it had secured “favourable” construction financing that was conditional on the property being rezoned from commercial to multi-family.
At Thursday’s meeting, Clark reiterated the foundation’s position that the effort was fundamentally a “downzoning,” pointing to the building’s previous use as a motel involving 28 water connections and significant month-to-month turnover, rather than the planned 18 dwellings –– including studios and one- to three-bedroom units.
Hospital officials have cited lack of housing as the biggest deterrent to potential new staff moving to Salt Spring.
The Executive Committee could see the application on its agenda as early as its Feb. 26 meeting, although LTC chair Tim Peterson said that was not guaranteed.
“We can’t force the EC to put it on their agenda,” said Peterson, who also sits on that committee, “but I’ll certainly advocate for that.”
As consumers and manufacturers on both sides of the world’s longest land border brace for the impact of tariff actions and other threats from the United States, regional government officials are paving the way for a local response.
In a pair of unopposed same-day-consideration motions, the Capital Regional District (CRD) board voted to task staff with rapid analyses of the potential impact of U.S./Canada tariffs on the work of that body, and of prioritizing Canadian-made products and services during the international trade dispute.
The board wants that reporting ready for the next finance committee meeting on March 5.
Sidney mayor and CRD board chair Cliff McNeil-Smith noted the broad national understanding that tariff actions and other threats from the United States will cause “significant” economic hardship, and that everyone from individual Canadians to businesses to senior levels of government were acting quickly.
“Other entities are looking to see what they can do to support their communities,” said McNeil-Smith at the board’s Feb. 12 meeting. “This would be supporting our region and Team Canada.”
In supporting the motions, Salt Spring’s CRD director Gary Holman said he felt officials would be wise to prepare for an extended period of dispute between the U.S. and Canada.
“Very clearly the instigator of the dispute is using tariffs as a bludgeon to get whatever he wants in terms of other public policy,” said Holman. “All this is not going to go away. We’re going to be dealing with this for four years.”
The regional district’s chief financial officer (CFO) Nelson Chan told directors the implications of the U.S. actions –– and of Canada’s national response –– would likely go beyond procurement.
Chan said he had been on a call with regional CFOs to “walk through” motions being prepared at various councils, and that like many of them, the CRD, the Capital Regional Hospital District and the Capital Region Housing Corporation all purchase some goods and services in U.S. dollars –– and could be affected by currency exchange rate movement.
