Not a dime of the $21.4 million federal housing grant recently delivered by Prime Minister Justin Trudeau will be directly spent on building new units, say city officials.
Rather, the money will go toward efforts to speed up the city’s residential development project review and approval processes, as was always planned.
Trudeau made a stop in Guelph on Jan. 12 to announce the Housing Accelerator Fund (HAF) grant, which is meant to aid in the creation of 739 more housing units than average during the next three years.
In a presentation to council’s committee of the whole on Tuesday, city staff outlined how the federal money will be spent, with an eight-part action plan in place.
“The HAF program and all of its components come together to form a unique and complex system of targets, funding calculations and initiatives,” said Kim Krawczyk, the city’s manager of policy and intergovernmental relations. “Because this program is focused on transformational and systemic changes, we do forecast and anticipate that we’ll be able to see the positive outcomes and benefits … much further beyond the actual three-year lifecycle of the program itself.”
That plan includes creation of a framework for the use of city and county-owned land for housing (including a 12-unit affordable housing demonstration project), encouraging homeowners to build accessory dwelling units and other “missing middle units” in existing neighbourhoods, as well as reductions to parking minimums.
Grant money will also be used to complete and implement a new housing affordability strategy, use of new and/or enhanced processes, planning for infrastructure and servicing capacity (focused on Downtown Guelph and the planned Guelph Innovation District in the east end), and creation of a pilot project regarding the community planning permit system.
“It’s about supporting, incentivising and attracting development of housing types that are most-need in Guelph,” noted Cushla Matthews, the city’s senior policy planner. “It’s also about unlocking lands for development where infrastructure barriers exist, and it’s about refining and/or enhancing approaches to further reducing those existing barriers.”
Staff plans to submit progress reports to council as the action plan initiatives move forward.
