Community housing the key to ending N.S. housing crisis ‘now and forever,’ says advocate

As the Nova Scotia government contends with a housing market that faces a shortage of affordable units and problems with homelessness, Michael Kabalen sees an obvious answer.

“The thing that will end [the housing crisis] now and forever is the community housing, the non-profit housing sector,” Kabalen, executive director of the Affordable Housing Association of Nova Scotia, told reporters following an appearance Wednesday at the legislature’s public accounts committee.

“The group of providers that offer housing that will ensure that whenever any of us face troubles and we need a more affordable place to live it’s there, is the community housing sector.”

Kabalen and other witnesses who appeared before the committee to discuss the government’s five-year action plan on housing acknowledged that progress is happening three years into the plan.

A lack of ‘realistic backup options’

Neil Lovitt, a real estate consultant and vice-president at Turner Drake, said changes in federal immigration policies have reduced demand and there is an overall increase in vacancy rates as more units come online.

But Lovitt cautioned against anyone declaring victory given that although vacancy rates for higher-end units are at a more sustainable three per cent mark, the bottom half of the rental market continues to have a vacancy rate below one per cent.

“Large swaths of the population remain tenuously housed without realistic backup options,” he told MLAs.

“So growing the non-market sector continues to be paramount.”

Government officials told MLAs that non-market housing accounts for three to four per cent of the province’s housing stock.

Kabalen said his organization favours that number being closer to 20 per cent, as it is in some European countries, because it would prevent the boom and bust cycles that can happen when market housing makes up a larger component of available stock.

A call for more supportive housing

At a minimum, Kabalen said he’d like to see the province commit to a goal of seven per cent, which is the average among the 38 member countries of the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development.

As for how to help the most vulnerable members of society, Kabalen’s organization released a report Wednesday making the case that investments in sustainable housing are more effective for the bottom line and for people affected than a “reactive, crisis-driven system that is financially unsustainable and socially inadequate.”

The report shows that using social housing, where someone has a place to live and wraparound services to support their mental and physical health, costs 25 to 50 per cent of what the government pays for other options such as emergency shelter or hospital beds or jails.

“Every dollar we redirect from reactive emergency systems into permanent supportive housing saves public funds and breaks the cycle,” said Kabalen.

“People are being successfully housed today who would otherwise have no path to stability.”

Government officials appearing before the committee acknowledged there’s more work to do with two years remaining in the plan, but pointed to increasing housing starts and partnerships with non-profits to preserve existing housing stock as positive signs.

The most recent provincial budget increased funding for community housing programs, and work continues on hundreds of new public housing units.

Associate deputy minister Vicki Elliot said signs that they’re on the right track include improved working relationships with players in the housing sector, such as “when developers have you on speed dial” and see things improving, and when community providers are able to solve issues with government officials over a cup of coffee.

“You can’t change anything in silos and I’ve never seen more work done at a systems level than I have since I joined [the Growth and Development Department].”

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