Tag Archives: Affordable Housing

Housing, Politics, Poverty

Rachel Blaney: Canada needs a ‘Bar of Dignity’

According to data from the 2016 census, 20% of Quadra Island residents and 27% of Cortes Island residents are paying more for their homes in rent or mortgages than they can afford. More recent studies suggest that a significant number of families throughout the Strathcona Regional District (SRD) are so financially stretched that they are at risk of becoming homeless. 75% of the ‘housing insecure’ respondents to the ‘Collecting Stories of Where We Live’ survey on Cortes Island, and 33% on Quadra Island, are working. These are some of the people North Island-Powell River MP Rachel Blaney is referring to, when she talks about the need for a bar of dignity.

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Uncategorized

The Quadra Project – Population

Civilizations are precarious. They seem remarkably permanent to the people who are living within them, but history has a long list of civilizations that have failed. Some were conquered. However most just extended themselves beyond their problem-solving capabilities until a combination of environmental stresses and internal failures eroded the viability of the structure that held them together.

Our present global civilization is a marvellous accomplishment for humanity, unprecedented in human history. Yet it is beginning to feel precarious because the corrective responses that are needed from us to address its stresses seem beyond our human capabilities. Some of these stresses feel overwhelming because of their immensity and complexity. Others feel overwhelming because they seem to exceed our ability to act collectively with resolve and persistence. The uncomfortable feeling we are getting is that the very success of a global civilization may contain the germ of its failure.

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Housing, Poverty

Solutions for the ‘Unsheltered’ and ‘at Risk’ crisis on Cortes and Quadra Islands

According to Linda Bernicki, Director of Rural Health and Wellness at the  Rural Development Network, “Housing is a human right and just not housing, safe and stable housing is a human right. So if I’m in housing that doesn’t have any heat or running water, then I’m denied a basic human right, and it takes all levels of government and all levels of society to work together to start to develop responses that is going to limit and homelessness.” 

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Housing

Tiny home resolution endorsed at UBCM

By Rachelle Stein-Wotten, Gabriola Sounder, Local Journalism Initiative Reporter

The Union of BC Municipalities’ membership endorsed a resolution calling for changes to the BC Building Code to allow for tiny homes as permanent dwellings.

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Housing, Poverty

Demographics of the ‘Unsheltered’ and ‘At Risk’ on Cortes and Quadra Islands

There were at least 159 Cortes Island residents living in ‘unsheltered’ or ‘at risk’ conditions when they responded to the housing needs survey last spring. There was a smaller response on Quadra and the Outer Islands, so only 69 were identified. These are both low numbers. At one point during our interview Emma Wallace, who oversaw this project, suggested the actual number for Cortes might be 10% higher. So I guesstimate about 175 people in a population of about 1,100 are in unstable housing situations. (I do not believe there is enough data to make a serious guesstimate in Area C.)  

Wallace is employed by the Rural Development Network, which was commissioned to do this study by the Campbell River & District Coalition to End Homelessness and the Urban Indigenous Housing and Wellness Coalition. In today’s program she gives a demographic sketch of the unsheltered and at risk population.

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