Chatham-Kent Council approved an application for round two of the Housing Accelerator Fund (HAF) during Monday’s council meeting.
The HAF is a federal program that provides funding to Canadian municipalities so housing can be built and approved faster.
Chatham-Kent was unsuccessful in the first round of applications in the fall of 2023. With the announcement of an additional $400 million to the fund, only those unsuccessful in the first round were allowed to apply.
CK Director of Housing Development Ray Harper explained to council that certain provisions needed to be made for this second application to be successful. Including that, the municipality must commit to a housing supply growth target that increases the issue of residential building permits by 10 percent or better over three years.
Some of the ways Chatham-Kent is proposing to increase housing development is to create an online building permit and land use dashboard, permit four stories or more for commercial/residential buildings that are located along key corridors in urban areas, facilitate permits, and implement and maintain an affordable housing strategy.
One point of contention was allowing up to four units on a single lot or dwelling. Ward 4 Councillor Rhonda Jubenville was opposed since the current allotment is three.
“I’ll be honest this scares me, it really does. I understand the spirit of this but…it would completely change the landscape of the urban centers” Jubenville told council.
Ward 1 Councillor Melissa Harrigan understood the groups’ reservations but reminded council to look at the bigger picture.
“After being missed in round one of accelerator funds I think there was a lot of disappointment in being looked over as a community, knowing what those housing needs are,” said Harrigan.
“I would just hate for us to have this opportunity to really invest in housing and affordable housing and for us to then pass that by.”
The motion passed 16-1 with Jubenville voting against and Councillor Thompson not present.
A notice of motion regarding affordable housing was also put forward for the council meeting on January 27 by Ward 2 Councillor Anthony Ceccacci. In his notice, Ceccacci wants the municipality to focus on affordable housing and its inventory of buildings while also allowing residents to see what the investments have been and what that has leveraged into.
Ceccacci also wants administration to research and apply for funding from upper levels of government that are available to help ease the burden on taxpayers.
“We are not set up for the funding mechanisms that are being required right now. That’s why It’s so important to ensure that we have properties ready so we can get significant funding from the upper levels of government,” explained Ceccacci.
“What this really does is cement that as a municipality, as a council we are still providing direction to administration to express interest in surplus properties. And to ensure that as local governments we are trying to do our best to tackle the problems that are not necessarily at our level.”
The Ward 2 Councillor hopes his motion will be passed at the next council meeting since many grants require buildings or properties to be ready to go when applying.
“When they come to the floor people are very concerned about the pricing or the purchasing. The comment we hear regularly is maybe the municipality shouldn’t be involved in real estate transactions, but at this point, there are minimal options,” explained Ceccacci.
“If we do not increase our affordable housing, people that are toeing the line of being able to survive are pushing that much closer to being potentially homeless as well.”
