Barrie is making progress on its affordable housing goals.
On Monday night, City Council received the Affordable Housing Monitoring Report–a 10-year plan that aims to encourage, stimulate and increase the supply and range of affordable housing options to meet the needs of residents, at all income levels and stages of life.
The report found Barrie has created 872 new affordable housing units, surpassing the goal of 840 set in 2015.
However, vacancy rates remain low, and the price of rent continues to climb, while market homeownership is becoming increasingly unaffordable for many Barrie residents, with average resale home prices quickly climbing.
Over $1.7M in Affordable Housing Development Grants was awarded in 2020 under the City’s new Community Improvement Plan for future affordable housing units.
The City says several upcoming initiatives will address housing affordability issues. These include a report card of the strategy, City-initiated changes to the zoning by-law, and the establishment of the Affordable Housing Task Force by Council this spring.
Visit barrie.ca/AffordableHousing to read the full report and for more information.
COVID-19 Update for April 13th – decided to talk about how this ends, the light at the end of the tunnel. Lots of scary stuff right now. But let's not forget – we're in the endgame. Stay Strong Barrie! pic.twitter.com/JEqM5DXpOV
— Jeff Lehman (@jedi_lehman) April 13, 2021