Grande Prairie homeowners could soon get their backyard suite projects underway as City Council gave two readings to a new set of regulations regarding the issue.
During their recent Monday meetings, councillors opted to push the topic of backyard suites down the line once again, meaning residents who wish to build a garden suite will be forced to wait for a third reading on the new regulations, which will not be brought up again for at least two weeks.
Council did make some changes to the new potential bylaw including limiting the height of garden suites to 7.6 metres to the top of the roof or the height of the main house or whichever is lower, and limiting the maximum square footage of a backyard suite to 80 per cent of the total floor area of the main house or 75 square metres, again whichever is smaller.
Additionally, homeowners will have to choose between a basement development, a backyard suite or garage suite, or running a home-based business.
Deputy Mayor Gladys Blackmore spoke on the matter, saying housing shortages are a problem that has been discussed at all levels of government for years now. She says the time is now to begin addressing the housing crisis at the municipal level.
“Housing and the shortage of housing across Canada have been a subject of debate for two or three years at least, at the federal level, the provincial level, and of course the municipal level,” she says. “The federal government has made it pretty clear they want municipalities to investigate all types of additional housing, in all types of housing markets in the municipal boundary.”
The topic has been a hotly debated one in City Hall for around eight months, and Blackmore maintains the reason it has taken so long to bear fruit is simply due to her council’s desire to ensure housing is addressed in the most informed way possible.
“We’ve done that through increasing the ability to build a basement suite, and now we’ve added garden suites to that lineup,” she says. “Garden suites are quite common in many other communities but they are new to Grande Prairie, it took some time to figure out what this council is comfortable supporting.”
When it comes to affordable housing as a whole, Blackmore indicates that Grande Prairie’s City Council is looking at a variety of options including apartment building developments, red tape reduction strategies for secondary suites, and opening up the discussion with home builders.
“Your municipal government doesn’t build homes, we open doors to help other people build houses,” she says. “The apartment industry across Canada has been depressed for quite a while, but it is particularly depressed in places like Grande Prairie, where their return on investment is not high enough to encourage people to build apartment buildings.”
“There are some things that have taken place that would maybe make that more palatable for builders and we are seeing that some apartment building projects seem to be moving forward in the city.”
Despite the discussions beginning to materialize in some ways, the Deputy Mayor says it could be “a good two years” before any projects enter the development permit stage, and maybe even longer before shovels are in the ground.
