While we realize many Peaks of Grassi residents woke up disappointed on Wednesday as word of council support of second and third readings for Town of Canmore bylaw 2015-19 trickled out, we will commend mayor and council for staying the course on trying to tackle the issue of affordable housing in the community.
After all, the issue of affordable housing in Canmore is one that has been around, lingering like a bad odour, for years and years and years, without much action taken.
We realize many passionate arguments were made against the proposal for Peaks Landing, but in the end, many of the arguments made against the infill housing project were the same as could have been made against those who already have their homes in the neighbourhood.
Human/wildlife interaction in the wildlife corridor area is already an ongoing problem, it won’t start with new construction of Peaks Landing homes; steep creeks are unlikely to cause flood issues only for new infill homes, duplexes, PAH and market affordable units and parking concerns will simply have to be dealt with as the process moves along.
Possibly the most critical aspect of Tuesday’s (Jan. 19) council meeting was the option agreement for Canmore Community Housing Corporation (CCHC) to purchase a parcel from the developer to ensure that affordable housing is built, rather than in the future possibly providing more weekender accommodation that is not needed while doing nothing to address affordability.
In the end, without some certainty that affordable housing would be built, the entire angst-riddled Peaks Landing process would have been pointless.
While many held up a 1998 settlement agreement as a key issue in adding density to the area, 1998 is now a long time ago and the Canmore of today is not the Canmore of nearly 20 years ago. One can only look back for so long and we assume that in the back of their minds, mayor and the majority of council may have heeded the saying, “Don’t look back, you’re not going that way.”
After all, if one wants to look back, how far does one look? To 1998? To 1988, when Olympic events at the Canmore Nordic Centre sparked interest in an otherwise sleepy former coalmine town? That interest in a small mountain town just an hour from Calgary, after all, and the fact that getaway second homes could be purchased comparatively cheaply, was the start of many of today’s affordability issues.
Moving forward, and having now stated numerous times that Canmore council’s number one goal is to address the affordable housing issue, we assume future decisions on land use will follow the same tone. Also moving forward, it seems clear some kind of a CCHC purchase agreement will, and should be wherever possible, tacked onto decisions.
There were those who argued that there is still land that could see affordable housing built, but clearly the majority of the current council wasn’t willing to take a “wait and see” stance and hope for the best.
Officially, it would seem, Canmore is now somewhat past the point of hand-wringing and the moaning of “something needs to be done.” This council, more so than others of the past, has now done something.
