| As Calgary’s boom escalates, social services agencies in the city are finding it increasingly difficult to stay in the downtown core, and, at the same time, the city’s stock of affordable housing is dropping dramatically, says Terry Roberts, president of the Calgary Homeless Foundation.
The Alex Community Health Centre (ACHC), which is currently located in the Alexandra Centre in Inglewood, may be about to lose its headquarters. The centre runs a community health clinic as well as a seniors’ clinic, a community health bus that offers health care to homeless and low-income people, and a laundromat for low-income families. The health clinic is located in the building, which is owned by the city, but run by the Alexandra Centre Society, which also leases space to other organizations. The ACHC’s administration for the other services is also located in the building, although the services themselves are operated off-site.
Shirley-Anne Reuben, executive director of the society, says the ACHC had planned to move into another location and so it only had a lease until December 2005. However, the relocation fell through. Reuben says the society has offered to allow the health clinic to stay in the building, but it wants the ACHC to move its administrative headquarters because the society had already offered the space to another non-profit group.
Shelley Heartwell, executive director of the ACHC, says her organization has nowhere else to move its headquarters.
Inn From the Cold, an organization that houses homeless families in churches across the city, is another social agency trying to find a new location. It will operate temporarily out of the Central United Church, but is still looking for a new permanent headquarters.
Victory Outreach Church, located in Victoria Park, has to move by August due to Stampede expansion and hasn’t found a new location. The church offers services for the homeless, and also runs a housing program, an emergency food bank and a monthly chili night.
Roberts says he expects more and more social agencies will struggle to find locations in the downtown core in the future.
"I think in the coming five-year period as leases come up for renewal, the hot property market will affect all social service agencies because they’ll have to come up with more money for rent."
He adds that the city should be taking more responsibility for helping agencies find new locations.
Roberts says the lack of affordable housing in the city is compounding the challenges social agencies face. Housing prices increased by 20 per cent between January 2005 and January 2006, according to Statistics Canada. Meanwhile, he adds, redevelopment of the inner city is reducing the amount of affordable housing stock because apartment buildings are being transformed into expensive condos, and rooming houses in Victoria Park are getting bulldozed to make way for Stampede expansion.
"We have a lower number of affordable housing units than 10 years ago," says Roberts. "It’s a serious problem that I believe now will turn into a crisis over the next few years as the increases in property values flow through to higher rents."
The City of Calgary has set a target of building 200 new affordable housing units each year, but Roberts says that won’t be nearly enough to keep up with demand. Calgary Housing Company, which provides low-income housing in the city, currently has 1,747 people on its waiting list. Calgary’s apartment vacancy rate was 1.6 per cent as of October 2005, according to the most recent figure available from the Calgary Mortgage and Housing Corporation.
Roberts says he’s concerned about whether the new federal government will continue to fund the Affordable Housing Partnerships Initiative, an affordable housing agreement that was jointly funded by the federal and provincial government. The current agreement ends on March 31, 2007.
"We’re not making progress with supply. It’s being lost on so many fronts and the city continues to grow and there’s a large group, probably 20,000 people right now, who are paying 50 per cent of their income on housing and that’s just not affordable."
Diana Segboer, executive director of Inn From the Cold, says often her clients often end up on the street because they can’t afford to pay market rent. |
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