The B.C. government’s move to hit pause on a controversial supportive housing project in Richmond is drawing blowback from the city’s municipal leaders.
The proposed building at Cambie Street and Sexsmith Road would create 90 new supportive housing units to address homelessness in the city.
But it was met with fierce opposition from some local residents, who packed a recent community meeting where they raised concerns it would affect public safety.
On Friday, the province said it was suspending work on the Cambie Permanent Housing Project, a decision that’s proven unpopular with the city’s mayor.
“We have been working on this project for quite a number of years,” Richmond Mayor Malcolm Brodie told Global News.
Brodie said the facility was meant to be a more stable home for people transitioning out of a pair of temporary modular housing projects in the city.
He said he understood neighbours’ concerns, but that scrapping the project won’t make the city’s homeless disappear.
“So I ask the question, would people rather deal with them when they are housed, when they have a basic level of housing and a roof over their head and some kind of security?” he said.
“Or would they rather deal with them when they are on the street somewhere or in very marginal circumstances just scraping by? I think the way to deal with it is to give them a leg up.”
Richmond City Councillor Kash Heed said he felt the province’s abrupt reversal on the project was political.
“Now we’re going towards a provincial election, now they are fearful, now it seems that all of their principles for taking care of people have gone out the window,” Heed said.
“A lot of these people aren’t going to be voting for the NDP anyhow, and we have to be cognizant of that.”
Project opponents have welcomed the announcement, but say they don’t believe the pause is the end of the project.
“It’s just postponing it so that they can come back and after the election (and) impose it,” said Sheldon Starrett with the Stop Cambie Permanent Housing group.
Starrett said people living near the city’s two temporary modular housing sites have been dealing with break-ins, thefts, open drug use and street disorder.
“If you amalgamate both of these sites into one, you may have just one large area where there may be more problems amalgamating in those neighbourhoods,” he said.
Heed said opposition to the proposal was driven by misinformation about what the project would be, and urged the province to do a better job communicating who would live in the housing and how it would function.
“These are the same people that are complaining with respect to people that are out there in our public spaces right now,” he said.
“If we do not (get them housed), these people are going to end up back on your streets, back in your laneways and dying in our alcoves.”
In the meantime, the city has extended leases on its two temporary housing sites while the province weighs its options over the supportive housing project.