We demand immediate provincial government housing action to solve the housing crisis in BC:

  1. Build 10,000 units of good quality social housing per year.
  2. Prioritize social housing units for Indigenous Peoples, migrants, women, seniors, youth, people with mental health and physical disabilities including HIV/AIDs, and vulnerable low-income people who are disproportionately at risk of homelessness and hidden homelessness.
  3. Save existing low rent housing by enforcing maintenance standards; maintain non-market projects whose operating agreements are expiring; freeze rents & don’t allow increased rents when tenants move; and close loopholes in the Residential Tenancy Act to stop renovictions.
  4. Protect tenants. Recognize tenant unions and their power to negotiate with landlords; Make all supportive & student housing fully covered by the Residential Tenancy Act.
  5. Include everyone who needs housing. End eligibility discrimination and make all BC residents eligible for BC Housing. Extend housing rights to temporary migrant workers by granting them permanent legal status.
  6. Fund social housing through taxation as a social responsibility of the government, and support residents of communities to develop and manage their social housing themselves.

Endorsed by:
Aboriginal Front Door
ACORN
Agricultural Workers Alliance, Surrey Support Centre
Alouette Heights Supportive Housing
Alouette Home Start Society
Atira Women’s Resource Society
BC Association of Social Workers
BC Coalition of People with Disabilities
BC Employment Standards Coalition
BC Teachers’ Federation
Cafe Rebalde Latin American Collective
Carnegie Community Action Project
Carnegie Community Centre Association
Coalition of Progressive Electors (COPE)
Committee for Domestic Workers and Caregivers Rights (CDWCR)
Council of Canadians
Council of Senior Citizens Organizations (COSCO)
DTES Neighbourhood House
Faith in Action
Gallery Gachet
Gordon Neighbourhood House
Grandview Calvary Baptist Church
Grandview / Woodlands Food Connect
Greater Vancouver Japanese Canadian Citizens Association Human Rights Committee
Groupo De Apoyo Oscar Rosales
Interfaith Institute for Justice, Peace and Social Movements
Karma Teachers
Kettle Friendship Society
Lazara Press
Left Alternative
Longhouse Ministry Church
Lookout Emergency Aid Society
M’akola Group of Societies
Migrante BC
No One Is Illegal
Out On Campus
Pivot Legal
Power of Women
Raise the Rates coalition
Renters Union
SFU Department of Gender, Sexuality & Women’s Studies
Social Justice Centre UBC
Social Justice Committee of the Unitarian Church of Vancouver
Socialist Alternative Canada
Sociology and Anthropology Students’ Union – SFU
St. James Social Justice Group
Strathcona Residents’ Association
Streams of Justice
Together Against Poverty Society in Victoria
Vancouver Area Network of Drug Users (VANDU)
Vancouver Transgender Day of Remembrance Society
Women Against Violence Against Women (WAVAW) Rape Crisis Centre
Women Transforming Cities

Housing Crisis Solutions

Housing is the number one determinant of health and a fundamental necessity for individual and social well-being. Being homeless or living on the precipice of homelessness in unsafe, inadequate and insecure housing erodes physical and mental health and undermines human flourishing. Private market housing cannot address this immense need; the provincial government must take action and commit to a social housing strategy that will meet the crisis head-on.

A commitment of 1% of the provincial GDP (approx. $2 billion) annually would provide the resources for 10,000 units of new social housing each year. Sustained over the course of 12 years, this investment that would create decent and dignified housing for people in need and provide thousands of jobs as well.

In addition, vulnerable populations must be given priority for social housing, existing affordable housing must be protected, and renters supported through implementing rent controls and empowering tenant unions.

Therefore, we are calling on the government of BC to build new social housing, protect and improve already existing social housing, and support renters in their efforts to access safe, affordable and secure housing.