September 22, 2007
1:30pm – 4:30pm
Present – 31 people (mostly landowners, 5 renters)
Erin O’Brien, Bill Engleson and 29 others
Agenda
- affordable housing
Introduction to ISLA and its history, what’s going on today/intent, where ISLA is going on Denman…?
Advisory Planning Commission – has been asked to continue to look at affordable housing. APC has been asked to help provide a framework in which affordable housing could be delivered. Opportunity to determine any input into the OPC is still there and welcome.
1.
Agreements –
Finish at 4:30 at the latest
No interrupting, each person has the time to speak (5 minutes)
DNL off topic
Confidentiality for disclosure of any “non-conforming” situations
Respectful dialogue – anything outside of that not be in the meeting
Recognise housing diversity
2.
Who’s here – individuals/organizations?
- Concern for lack of housing on island
- Innovative ideas
- Wants to see what comes out of this
- Interested in “bottom up” forms of affordable housing rather than “top down”
- Diversity of housing
- “ex-single mother” has gone from struggling for housing to wanting to share what she has
- Wants to assist in enabling someone to have housing
- See lots not particularly working, sees many possibilities to address this
- Impossible for kids to come back to island
- Part of a working group with DIWOS
- Wants to see alternatives for single mothers
- Wants to be able to share large property (lllll landowners)
- Have experienced the downfalls of living in a dangerous situation due to seeking affordable housing
- Representing DICEEC, DISHS (2 reps)
- Seniors shouldn’t live apart from the community that they are in
- Wants to see how affordable housing and senior’s housing could be intertwined
- 7/10 of island conversations always come back to housing
- Do we need a collaborative housing authority?
- Interested in accessory dwelling situation
- Lives in a land sharing situation
- 3 members of APC looking at affordable housing issue
- Interested in accessory dwelling
- Builder – helped build elder housing on Hornby (takes a big commitment and devoted working group to pull it off)
- Have ideas for short term answers to families living in inadequate housing
- Interested in hearing from everybody
- Wants concrete things to happen
- Members of DIWOS housing committee (two representatives?)
- People with disabilities need housing now
- Spirit of community remains intact as people move here
- We need to hang onto the school, need everyone in community, diversity = rich, rich fabric that has been woven over the years
- We need to be aware of the intertwining with the “footprint” we have on the island
- Seniors housing has evolved from Abbey field (which no longer exists)
- Interested in intentional community as a way to share resources, implement more “eco-friendly” aspects to community – ECO-village
- Some of the best things that happen on this island happen outside of the institutions
- Particular focus being on elderly (fixed income) and families with children coming together through accessory dwellings
- Makes me nervous to not know who is a renter and who is a property owner
- Housing is deeply personal
- Insecure housing breeds fear
- Wants to keep a light footprint, but finds it difficult to speak out about it due to “illegal” person housing circumstances
- Gentrification is making affordable housing difficult for everyone
- Don’t know what’s legal or illegal
- Accessory dwelling should be pursued
- Vendor take back is a wonderful way to try to address access to land
- Has lived in various situations over the years
- Insecure housing due to not owning land
- Dealing with “environmental allergies”
- Has particular housing needs due to allergy to synthetic building materials
- Has been living outdoors for 12 years
- Denman is a resourceful place, impressed by the people here
- Encourage group and community to access every member of the community in finding solutions
- Lives in a small earth friendly dwelling, finds alternatives to dealing with water, sewage and energy
- Concerned that there is some opposition to the co housing project and wants to offer support to the co housing project
- Concerned for the elderly people who live alone, over 70 years old and live alone
- A lot of these seniors would like to stay on the island but need a suitable situation where someone is taking care of their gardens, their needs
- Has experience with social housing – coming up with designs for people living together
- Worked with teens finding housing in the city
- Lived communally for a very long time - ran out of the energy that it requires
- It’s clear that affordable housing is not really available
- People find their own housing – an individualistic activity – no organization will provide it – this ties into “ground up” approach
- curious
3.
Who is missing?
The parents who didn’t accept the offer of free childcare
People who are living in their vehicles
Single parents
DIRA
Co housing group
People opposed to co housing
Builders
Someone who has rented a place for 35 years and owners want to move
People who have separated and want to stay on their land
Research
Those renters who are left with nothing when the power goes out – but still must pay rent
Absentee landowners
Kids who’ve grown up on the island, left and who have/want to come back
Those with the most need are more likely to not come to the meetings (this speaks to the hopelessness of the situation)
The elder elders are underrepresented
Specialists
Realtors
Erin identified this as a sub-committee project work that needs doing
4. Discussion
Idea – local investors could put money towards holding first mortgage for a first time (non-qualifying) buyer. Interest tends to be lower than bank rate; risk is slightly higher, but high social investment
Accessory Dwellings – OCP is greatly restrictive in this respect. With large acreage (>40 acres) inability to provide housing or otherwise share this land.
Co-housing – opposes current co-housing application. Opposition is not against co-housing in general, but LTC hasn’t put enough regulations in place to make public more comfortable with the application.
Accessory dwellings – Riane spoke on history of split of vote in original Accessory dwelling committee. Vote against accessory dwellings at that time was NOT a vote against affordable housing – rather it was a vote against market driven secondary dwellings.
DIWOS cmtee report – submitted to Erin and Bill for the record
Families who are renting a place that is inadequate – couldn’t we build a little collection of mobile (hypo-allergenic?) “teen-age” or “granny” suites/trailers that are used for several years then go back to the communal pot
We collect the excess building materials from job sites and use these materials to build the above.
Those who don’t need the resource could still work at providing it for others.
Caravan type thing on Hornby – mouldy, synthetic all sorts of things that make it impossible for some people to even walk into.
Volunteer corps to help people to fix up their “miserable” rental home to bring it to readiness to go into the winter. (names deleted but you know who you are)
We could begin a Denman Island Re store.
Housing agreements could help to assure that accessory dwellings are kept affordable. However, this goes against the suggestion of a “bottoms up” solution.
Investing – those who have money acting on behalf of those who don’t. Conservancy has in their mandate acting on behalf of the land but also on behalf of the people. DCA has been approached previously but they, at that time, expressed that looking at housing is not within their mandate.
Suggestion that elder housing would be wonderful on Central Park property.
Karl (name not excluded) has offered some wood for people to pick up for heating.
Maintaining the rural nature of the community. Avoid ghettoization – don’t keep those in need of affordable housing from those who don’t need it. People have to be able to get to things they need.
Rent control – question as to whether it can be overseen by Islands Trust. Lottery system to decide who gets to build an accessory dwelling.
Fear that people are living in substandard or dangerous situations. Disputes could be settled by ombudspeople within community.
Renters feel insecure in the atmosphere of no protection or agreements to protect them.
Housing agreements could be made, then overseen by a community body.
Building costs could be astronomical. Who would/could build an accessory dwelling then rent it out for a low amount?
Habitat for Humanity has so far rejected applications from Denman as there is no land available/donated.
Forgivable loan available (through CHMC) to those who affordably rent out a suite for an agreed upon period of time to an elderly person.
The difference between those who own their own homes and those who don’t. It can be easy to compartmentalise. However, circumstances could change suddenly – separation, illness, bankruptcy, other reasons. Those who do own their own land do have a vested interest in working on these issues.
Parents are aging. Warehousing of seniors is one extreme, elder parents living with their adult children in community is another extreme. The latter may be illegal. However, it may make sense to break these laws.
Landowners on this island are already providing affordable housing. They do so at some risk to themselves, primarily from neighbour’s complaints. These people are vulnerable to current bylaws. Moving to a fine system (as Islands Trust is currently suggesting) could effectively wipe out a large number of affordable units on the island. We as a group should oppose this move. Is there some way to protect these landowners and protect the housing that is being provided to those in need?
Proactive action – an amnesty to those who are currently providing housing to those on the island.
Some people benefit from the no cap and lack of authority. While they lose from staying below the radar, there is also some gain.
Even renters on Denman are privileged people.
Mudgirls (cob building) are a resource that we could call on.
Land sharing – how do we approach land sharing between elders who wish to stay on their land and those who need access to land. How do we take care of the needs of both (elders to have something to leave to their children, accessers to have stable living and something to show for the time they’ve spent on the land and the age they now are?)
People’s bank could provide some sort of “forgivable” loan for those who need to upgrade a rental place to make it safer.
Hospitality is the hallmark of civilization. A community that looks after itself and each other is a wonderful thing.
5.
Where to focus, where do we go now?
Update on what ISLA is up to
Infrastructure also ties into housing – roads, gardens, etc
Community gardens could be a way to address this – making living on Denman more affordable by proving access to home/self grown food.
We need to not ghettoise by stopping focussing on elder housing or affordable housing and begin to think about people housing.
Research how other societies have approached these issues of adequate and safe housing in a way that enfranchises all with respect.
Who needs help right now, to get through the winter?
What about meeting one more time to identify actions then move to action. Meet in a month – (perhaps Oct 20th)
Ask people for land. Keep asking.
Possible Organizational Framework
-Research
-Action and Strategies
-Legal-trust-policy-agreements
-Grants, supports and Modelling
--Accessory Dwellings
--Land Share
--Co-Housing
--Questionnaire