It seems as though the City of Kamloops is unlikely to achieve its first-year, mandated targets for housing set by the provincial government this year.
Development Director Marvin Kwiatkowski says their analysis shows that Kamloops is only in-line to see 534 units built this year.
This is 145 units — or over 20 percent — below the province’s mandate of 679 units for the first year of the 5 year plan.
Kwiatkowski suggests the missing of the target is somewhat out of their hands at this point.
“We’re dealing with some labour market issues. We’re dealing with high interest rates. Some people might be looking at putting their projects off. We’ve got quite a few projects that aren’t simply moving along if you’re looking at single family homes,” said Kwiatkowski. “A lot of people are not looking to build right at this point and time just because of the interest rates. When I’m meeting with developers, the numbers are tight.”
Kwiatkowski tells Radio NL it’s unclear what the province may do as a result, but says he believes the province will be “reasonable.”
“When we do our first report here that’s due at the end of March, they’re going to be asking what sort of initiatives or what things are we moving forward on, sort of what things are kind of in the implementation stage.”
While the BC government has not specifically said what it might do if cities such as Kamloops don’t meet their housing targets.
Housing Minister Ravi Kahlon has told Radio NL they do reserve the right to bring in outside assistance to help cities achieve their goals.
“I’m confident that Kamloops understands, the staff there [at Kamloops City Hall] understand that important steps need to be taken,” said Kahlon as part of an interview with Radio NL in September. “Part of the legislation is about a 6-month check-in to see if the local government is actually taking this seriously. If not, we have the ability to bring in somebody independent to do an assessment of what the issue is, what barriers might exist… or maybe even come to a conclusion that there’s no interest [in hitting the targets]. In that case, we will step in and make appropriate decisions.”
