Gatineau mayor wants more help from province for affordable housing

Gatineau residents looking for affordable housing will be able to count on new buildings in Aylmer next year — but the mayor said it's not enough.

Mayor Maxime Pedneaud-Jobin met with Municipal Affairs and Housing Minister Andrée Laforest Thursday to propose ways the province could help out. 

"We have a crisis within a crisis," Pedneaud-Jobin said.

The mayor said the city was already short before the floods of 2017 and 2019 and the 2018 tornadoes, the latter wiping out 1,600 housing units alone.

Pedneaud-Jobin said it's harder than ever for people to find proper affordable housing.

The latest numbers from the Canadian Mortgage and Housing Corporation show a rental vacancy rate of only 1.2 percent in Gatineau as of November, down from 3.8 per cent the previous year.

It's below the provincial average of 2.3 per cent for communities larger than 10,000 people.

$6M investment

The province announced Thursday it's investing more than $6 million for the construction of 75 housing units, many for families in Aylmer.

The first will provide 30 new housing units in six buildings on rue Deschênes for families only, particularly those with several children, and should be completed in the fall of 2020.

The second project adds 45 housing units in the western part of the Plateau. Work has already begun and the first tenants are expected to move in early 2020.

Gatineau is contributing more than $1.8 million.

The mayor says this investment will help, but it won't solve the problem on its own.

"We're far from a solution, we would need hundreds more units," he said.

He said he's asked the government to adapt the provincial program to help build units that make sense for Gatineau's local reality.

"The program recognizes construction costs that are the same all over Quebec, but it's way more expensive in Gatineau to build," he said.

For him, the key to helping solve the affordable housing is in the long term.

"That would be a huge step for [developers] to move faster to give us more units because that's basically the real solution," he said.

He also said the government must invest in rental subsidies in places where people can't find affordable housing, with the government footing the difference in cost for up to five years until people can find available units.

Municipal Affairs and Housing Minister Andrée Laforest said she is satisfied with the working meeting she had Thursday abut how to tackle Gatineau's housing crisis.

"Our government is listening to the needs of our citizens." Municipal Affairs and Housing Minister Andrée Laforest said.

"We're working together to find the best possible solutions quickly and efficiently."