The City of Burnaby is seeking the public’s input on its proposed strategy for tackling housing and homelessness in the city.
The plan, titled Home: Burnaby’s Housing and Homelessness Strategy, is a follow-up to the now-defunct housing task force, which engaged over 2,600 residents before putting out its final report last fall. That process marked the first two phases of the city’s “Your Voice. Your Home.” engagement process on housing in the city.
“Following the success of the first two phases of ‘Your Voice. Your Home.,’ the City of Burnaby is extending the conversation into three new phases as we develop Home,” reads a statement on the city’s website.
“This will be a comprehensive policy document that addresses challenges and opportunities across the entire housing system, including reducing homelessness, based on the mayor’s task force recommendations.”
The city is currently in Phase 3 of the strategy development process, which is centred around developing the needs, goals and strategies key to the overall plan. Council gave a set of draft goals the go-ahead in a June 23 council meeting. In all, the city identified 23 strategies for tackling the housing crisis.
Among the strategies, the city is looking at maintaining its tenant assistance and rental-use zoning policies, which were both finalized earlier this year. It also included more vague directions, such as preventing people from entering homelessness, as well as more concrete goals, such as gentle density in neighbourhoods currently dominated by single-family housing.
The city noted in a news release that the housing strategy will be used to support its climate action framework, which is intended to guide the city to carbon neutrality by 2050.
The city’s survey will close on Thursday, Oct. 15. It can be found at burnaby.ca/yourvoice-housing.
For more information, contact the city at [email protected].
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