“Mail call!”
It seems in old war movies of WWII vintage, mail call was a moment of both jubilation and fear. All the grunts wanted to hear from home, but no one wanted the dreaded “Dear John” letter.
I can’t remember the last time I actually got mail that was anything but political flyers, advertisements or the occasional magazine. The same can not be said for email. That seems to come in regularly. Fortunately, my spam filter captures most of the kinds of things that appear in my Canada Post mailbox, but judging from the rest of it, there’s no surprise people who read this column seem concerned with their chances of landing decent housing in Tiny Town.
So, autumn cleaning, like spring cleaning, seems like a good time to clean out my inbox. Not that I don’t answer emails directly. Just seems some subjects come up like mushrooms in the forest this time of year.
Hey Max. You seem to have drunk the build-baby-build Kool-Aid. Weren’t you the guy who frequently called for right-sizing the resort? Reining in growth? Now you seem to be a cheerleader for more and more employee housing. Doesn’t have anything to do with you joining the WHA board, does it?
-Inquiring mind.
Until Kool-Aid comes in Scotch flavour, IM, I’ll pass on it—too much sugar.
Years ago, as a green lawyer arguing my first case, a crusty old judge called me to the bench for a “word.” It seems I’d made my point... repeatedly. Perhaps he was getting hungry or possibly bored, but he leaned down and said, “Counsellor, you’re beating a dead horse.” I cancelled the next three witnesses who were going to give that horse another kick and rested my case.
Right-sizing Whistler is a dead horse of a different nature. It’s an argument I’ve lost. Still dead, though... until market forces make it come alive some time in the future.
The current political reality is for the town to continue to build employee-restricted housing without abatement. The demand, from employees, employers and just about everyone in town who needs a better and more secure place to live, is relentless. In the math of politics, Demand + Political Will = Action.
I’m pretty sure Sun Tzu had something to say about not fighting battles you’ve already lost.
Dude. I’ve been on the WHA waitlist like forever. When are you going to build more housing?
-Reno Victed
Judging from your nom de plume, I’m going to hazard a guess you’re on the rental waitlist, Reno. To answer your question, I’m not going to build any housing. You wouldn’t want to live anywhere I’ve built, or even worked on.
But the efforts of the Whistler 2020 Development Corporation and the Whistler Housing Authority have managed to put up five new buildings since 2018, about one a year. Two more are coming out of the ground this moment.
There seems to be a common misconception, borne no doubt out of desperation, that creating housing is as easy as saying, “build more housing.” Actually, it makes rocket science look easy, rocket science being mostly math and engineering.
The key ingredients to building housing are land, labour, material, permits, and lots of money. Whistler is lucky to have the land, an Olympic™ legacy. After that, it gets a lot harder. It’s a toss-up at any given point in the development process which of the others is going to bite you on the ass and derail your efforts. Private developers in town will point to the permitting process. But labour is neither cheap nor abundant. The increases in the price of many building materials makes grocery shopping seem reasonable.
And money, well, let me know if you figure out how to rig the lottery. One of the reasons people come to see how Whistler has managed to build as much employee-restricted housing as it has is because it’s been done without direct taxpayer subsidies, the former Athletes Village excepted. I’m not sure how enthusiastic local taxpayers would be about underwriting employee housing. Not sure I want to find out.
My neighbours rent out a suite in their house through Airbnb. It’s like a revolving door over there. We don’t live in a part of town zoned for tourist accommodation. Why doesn’t bylaw shut them down?
-Steamed
Airbnb started out, like other disruptive businesses, as a pretty good idea. Rent a room in your house out to visitors, enhance their “experience” by having them stay with a local rather than in an anonymous hotel. That idea, quaint as it is, was sideswiped by investors who bought property for the sole purpose of flogging it on Airbnb.
As you say, Whistler does have restrictive zoning disallowing—and a bylaw requiring a business permit to do—nightly rentals. Both are enforced, albeit not with a great deal of gusto. And as with many towns, the fine is too puny to deter hardcore greedheads.
But if you haven’t ratted on your neighbours to bylaw, that’s the first step. I don’t know what the second step is, and Redneck Max gets in trouble telling people a litre of gas is cheap, so I won’t go there.
Ironically, the federal government, which just woke up to the housing woes rampant across the country, is floating the idea of inducing—strongarming?—municipalities to limit the number of Airbnbs through bylaw changes designed to increase long-term rentals. What’s ironic about it is an unnamed “government source” said it could alleviate rental shortages in places like Tiny Town and Banff. Obviously we’re a long way from Ottawa.
Max. Why doesn’t council force these greedy big homeowners to rent out rooms to us workers? They don’t live in their houses. No one does. We should just confiscate them.
-Power to the People
Hey, I saw your recommendation at the latest Vital Cafe. Just confiscate rich peoples’ homes and let the workers live there. What could go wrong? It has been tried in other places, Hungary comes to mind, as does... nevermind.
I guess it would work, as long as we overthrew government while we were at it. Ditto the Constitution and Charter of Rights and Freedoms, several hundred years of jurisprudence and widely held beliefs of most Canadians. But no doubt it would provide more housing.
Thing is, in most of those places where it’s happened, it wasn’t the workers who ended up being housed, at least not for very long. When the revolutionary dust settled, those houses tended to be occupied by bigwigs in the Party apparatus, who somehow seem to amass substantial wealth. At least until the counter-revolution.
But heck, might work here. Never know.
