The City of Vancouver is running short of ideas for solving the city's housing affordability crisis, so it is reaching out to the public for solutions.
The city has launched a competition designed to generate ideas for providing low-cost housing. The re:Think Housing contest will offer a total of $8,000 in cash prizes for the best ideas.
The city wants proposals that address affordability for low- and middle-income households, which are defined as $21,500 for an individual, or $86,500 for a combined household income. Proposals need to detail how proposed housing projects would meet those affordability criteria.
The re:Think Housing competition has two main categories – one for innovative ideas for large-scale affordable housing projects within 800 metres of rapid transit and another for flexible affordable housing options on smaller scales in residential neighbourhoods (granny suites, coach housing, etc.)
A total of $8,000 in cash will be awarded in four categories. The city will accept submissions until June 29, and winners will be announced in July.
The competition is just one idea from the mayor's task force on affordable housing, which has canvassed various strategies for addressing affordable housing.
"However many good ideas we've had, we feel this is such a great challenge in Vancouver, we just want to make sure there's not something missing," Abi Bond, the city's assistant director of housing policy, told Business in Vancouver. "There's no one solution to housing affordability, so we're really exploring every avenue."
The geographically constrained Vancouver area has the highest housing prices in Canada. With no real national affordable housing strategy, Canadian cities are limited in their ability to control housing prices or provide low-cost housing.
On top of soaring land costs, investment in real estate from Asia is believed to be exacerbating the problem of high real-estate prices, and there has been little purpose-built rental construction in B.C. since the 1970s.
The City of Vancouver has addressed some of the most urgent housing issues with the creation of 440 supportive housing units since December 2010. Another 240 social and supportive housing units are being built over the next few months.
The city has approved $41.5 million for affordable housing projects between 2012 and 2014.
