While many in Canmore welcomed the recent proposal from a local hotel to use part of its property to build a 90-unit rental apartment building, some concerns around the project have been raised.
Coast Hotel owner Michael Hannan said his proposed project for the rental units came as a result of analyzing potential uses for part of his property that currently sits unused and the fact Canmore faces an unprecedented shortage of affordable housing.
“There is a crying need for it and I think there are a bunch of reasons why there have not been any rental buildings built in many years,” Hannan said. “The costs are very expensive and people want to maximize profit and build expensive condos because that makes the most profit and it does not necessarily serve all the town’s needs.
“We looked at this piece of land we have and thought, ‘Well what can we do with it that makes sense?’ We can build more hotel units, but that probably is not what is needed.”
He said the parcel of land and its location makes it well suited for a purpose-built rental apartment building. It is close to Roam Transit, downtown, and could provide one, two and three-bedroom units.
Hannan said as owner of a hotel in Canmore, he has seen first hand the challenges of recruiting staff and keeping them when there is such a challenging rental market.
“We face the problem ourselves of trying to recruit people and having people leave because the cost of living in Canmore is very high, even for people who are making good salaries,” he said, adding people making in the range of $60,000 to $90,000 a year like teachers, nurses and police officers also feel the housing pinch.
“… normal people you need to be able to have community, so we felt it was a pretty good market for that.”
While council approved waiving development permit fees for the project to the tune of $12,000 earlier in January, there were concerns about how to guarantee rental units would remain as such in the long term.
Councillor Vi Sandford questioned how to guarantee a 90-unit apartment building will not be condominiumized in the future. Calgary has seen a large number of rental units in the past 10 years converted into condos, which essentially means they are subdivided and sold to individual owners.
Manager of planning and development Alaric Fish said a fee waiver does not obligate council to approve a rezoning application for the property, which is needed because currently any development would require 50 per cent commercial space.
Under the Municipal Government Act, Fish added, the municipality has no authority or ability to regulate ownership of property – thus council cannot require the building to remain rental through any legal mechanism.
He said administration is exploring options to find assurances the building will be rental. Fish said additional requirements could be placed on the rezoning approval as conditions of development “to ensure the eventual development meets council’s objectives.”
“They have stated it is their intent (for rental), they are not interested in a condo ownership development.”
Hannan said providing long-term rental housing is the ultimate goal of the project and, given the nearby Roam regional bus stop, he said that includes those who work in Banff.
“Also, our view is the private sector is a big part of the solution here and there is a private sector market for this type of activity under certain situations,” he said. “We need an increased supply of accommodation available for rent at reasonable rates in the Bow Valley.”
The fee waiver request does speak to the fact that the Town of Canmore does not have an approved affordable housing policy when it comes to providing incentives to the private sector for providing needed units of affordable housing, or any other form of housing.
While there is high level direction in the proposed Municipal Development Plan, general manager of municipal infrastructure Michael Fark said creating a policy around incentives for development is not a small issue.
“There are consequences to be explored and community consultation,” Fark said, adding it is not something to be created in a rush. “It is always going to be inherently situational and application of the policy will depend on the situation that comes forward.”
