Relaxing the act and…

Relaxing the act and regulations on designating heritage properties by municipalities can actually reduce available affordable housing in the short to long term, especially in areas where it is desperately needed. Owners and developers have hastened the running down, vacating and demolition of buildings in anticipation of constructing newer developments with more residential units. Often the units in these buildings are in higher price range than the units they replace. What is worse is that there are projects that take years to actually be constructed, or are never completed when funding and market conditions change. This leaves many vacant lots in cities, perhaps turned into temporary public spaces or parking lots where once there was affordable housing in accessible areas. The demolition causes a loss of taxable revenue to the municipalities as tax rates for empty lots are less than if a building still occupied the space. That lost revenue could be invested in other programs including subsidizing low-income housing. Having demolished the building removes the possibility that another owner or developer could have worked with the existing building to redevelop it. Working with an existing building has been shown to be a greener, sustainable approach over demolishing and building new. It preserves local culture and also creates more jobs. One may think that this is a legacy of the past, but this is still happening today. Having more powers at least for designating properties is one way to slow down unneeded and too early demolitions. Other measures could be taken to address this by having other acts and regulations updated to give more power to municipalities to enforce the need for owners maintain existing building stock; oblige owners to keep buildings maintained and rentable until a project is secure to start construction; oblige owners and developers to guarantee that new developments provide an equal number of low-cost housing units to the ones that are lost from the demolished building.