Homes You Can Actually Afford
On July 6, during my launch speech, I asked: “How do we create attainable homes while protecting the characteristics that make people want to live in Saanich in the first place?”
Land-use planning is one of the lowest-rated municipal service areas in Saanich, and housing affordability is a major concern for residents. Speaking with community members, I hear from seniors who feel forced out of the neighbourhoods they helped build and young professionals who can no longer picture staying in the community where they grew up. Today’s housing policies should not inadvertently make long-term home ownership less sustainable for seniors or attainable for the next generation.
Too often, the housing conversation gets flattened into growth versus no growth. I don’t believe Saanich has to choose between housing and the community we love. Saanich needs thoughtful growth, housing choice and predictable planning, not growth for the sake of increasing unit counts.
The real question is whether Saanich is creating the right types of housing people can actually afford, in the right places, with the infrastructure and services to support the people who will live there, while protecting environmentally sensitive areas and neighbourhood livability.
I’m not calling for fewer rules. I’m calling for a practical approach with clearer, more efficient processes and predictable decisions. People shouldn’t have to wait years for a decision on housing that already aligns with established community objectives. Across Saanich, there are lots that once had family homes that are now overgrown and vacant; properties that could accommodate neighbourhood-appropriate family homes, with secondary and garden suites providing additional housing choice and opportunities to improve affordability.
As a former Director of Local Government, I led modernization work across finance, land-use planning, permitting, licensing and asset management. That experience taught me that affordability is as much a municipal service-delivery issue as it is a housing-supply issue.
My Housing Priorities
1. Make attainability the measure of success, not unit counts.
Building more housing is important, however the number of units approved to be built does not tell us whether people can afford to live in them.
Saanich needs to measure whether it is creating the housing people actually need, including:
- attainable rental housing;
- below-market housing;
- secondary and garden suites;
- smaller homes;
- family-sized homes;
- accessible housing; and
- realistic pathways to home ownership.
The goal is housing choice for different incomes and different stages of life.
2. Create more housing choice in existing neighbourhoods.
Not everyone needs or can afford a large single-family home. Suites, garden suites, duplexes, townhomes and other forms of gentle densification can provide more attainable choices while allowing existing neighbourhoods to evolve. I support thoughtful infill that adds housing without treating every neighbourhood as though it has the same capacity, infrastructure or context.
More housing choice. Thoughtful growth. Better municipal delivery. Protect what matters.
3. Put greater density where Saanich can support it.
More significant growth, including small-scale multi-unit housing, makes sense where transportation, water and sewer infrastructure, schools, parks, community services and other amenities can support additional residents. That means connecting housing decisions to the infrastructure and services required to support the people who will live there.
Growth should be a lived opportunity rather than a burden placed on communities without the infrastructure to support it.
4. Make the planning and permitting systems predictable and responsive.
People should not have to navigate an unnecessarily complicated or uncertain municipal process to create housing that meets established community objectives. My approach is not fewer rules. It is clearer rules, better coordination and more predictable decisions.
Saanich should identify unnecessary bottlenecks, improve coordination between departments, establish clear expectations and provide timely decisions on appropriate housing applications.
My professional experience gives me a practical understanding of why these issues matter. During my career in information technology and management consulting, I worked with local governments across North America. As Director of Local Government, I led software modernization initiatives involving finance, land-use planning and permitting, providing hands-on experience with municipal workflows and operations.
That experience gave me direct insight into how municipal operations work, and how disconnected processes, outdated technology, and organizational bottlenecks can affect the citizens those processes are meant to serve. I will bring that same practical, coordinated approach to housing.
Good policy only matters if government can deliver it.
5. Protect the pathway to home ownership.
Housing policy needs to consider more than today’s rental market.
Today’s young professionals and families should have a realistic opportunity to become tomorrow’s homeowner without being forced to leave Saanich. That means ensuring today’s housing policies don’t inadvertently make long-term home ownership less attainable for the next generation.
6. Support attainable and secure rental housing.
Renting is an important part of a healthy housing system. Students, young adults, families, seniors and people between stages of life all need secure rental options.
Saanich’s Housing Strategy recognizes the need to address the full housing spectrum, from non-market and below-market housing through rental and home ownership. Saanich should work with non-profit housing providers, BC Housing and other levels of government to support projects that provide lasting affordability, not simply temporary increases in supply.
7. Use public land strategically.
Where Saanich-owned land is appropriate for housing, Council should examine opportunities to partner with non-profit and other housing providers to create attainable and below-market homes.
Public land is a limited community asset. When it is used for housing, residents should understand what long-term community benefit is being created and why that approach represents responsible use of public resources.
8. Plan housing together with transportation, infrastructure and community services.
A home is not truly attainable if the cost of getting to work, school, childcare, shopping or essential services makes living there unaffordable. Housing decisions should be connected to transportation, transit, roads, sidewalks, parks, schools, utilities and other community infrastructure. These aren’t competing interests.
Saanich needs housing choices that people can actually afford, not simply more housing.
Building housing without planning for the people who will live there is not responsible growth.
Housing is about people, not numbers:
- A young adult who wants to stay close to family;
- A young family trying to buy its first home;
- A senior who wants to remain in the neighbourhood they helped build;
- A renter looking for a secure place to call home;
- A family looking for enough space to grow;
- A homeowner hoping to downsize without leaving Saanich.
A healthy community should allow people to move through different stages of life:
renting → saving → buying a first home → raising a family → downsizing
My approach is to expand housing choice, encourage attainable homes, improve municipal processes and direct growth where Saanich has the infrastructure and services to support it. At the same time, protecting the natural environment, mature trees, neighbourhood livability and the community assets that make people want to live here in the first place.
We don’t have to choose between housing and the community we love. We can have both.
Homes You Can Actually Afford.
Protecting What Matters.