Public Builder

Waterloo Region Housing (WRH), the region's pretend-Municipal Housing Corporation, which operates as just another department, has built just 105 net units over 3 years. The most recent 10-year plan calls for building 638 new affordable units on five of WRH's 65 properties over ten years. This is not enough.  As well, we know the private sector cannot be relied on to build the amount of affordable housing we need. Clearly the current model is not building the housing we need to keep Waterloo a prosperous and growing, and beautiful city.

What we need is a new model, one that houses our community while using public resources effectively. We need to move to a Municipal Housing Corporation model, the model that is employed in all of the other major cities in this province.

A municipal housing corporation (MHC) is an arms-length corporation fully owned by Waterloo and other government partners (Kitchener, the Region, etc.) should they choose to join us. This corporation would be tasked with surveying the housing needs of Waterloo, acquiring land, building housing, renting out these units, and acting as their property manager. Many cities already have such a corporation that has been providing affordable housing for decades.

To build housing for the long term, alongside our partners, we need an institution and not just another project for city staff. An MHC offers more legal and financial flexibility than the city alone can provide while remaining publicly owned.

The city would own this corporation outright.  It would also be able to reinvest revenue it makes from housing construction, with the goal of it becoming self-sustaining and growing at scale into the future. 

It is only through forming this Public Builder Municipal Housing Corporation that we can responsibly build at the scale we need to make our city affordable.