Skip to content

Housing bylaw addition scrapped

UPDATED — June 4, 3:10 p.m.
020610_BB_rooming_1
Paul Kusnierczyk, a New Sudbury resident, said he opposed planning staff's recommendation to zone more areas for rooming and boarding houses. He said there are already problems with controlling noise and littering in illegal rooming and boarding houses in New Sudbury. Photo by Bill Bradley.

UPDATED — June 4, 3:10 p.m.

City planning committee members have decided to scrap proposed changes in the city's housing bylaws which would allow for temporary housing accommodations — boarding houses and rooming houses — to expand outside of the city's core, after about 200 home owners protested at its meeting June 1.

“The people have won,” Joscelyne Landry-Altmann, Ward 12 councillor, said.

The homeowners were protesting city staff's recommendation to increase the areas where rooming and boarding houses can be legally zoned. Currently, they are only legal in the city's downtown core and a few other sites nearby. Staff argued the three post-secondary institutions and the expansion of the mining sector had created a demand for temporary housing arrangements.

Eric Blondin, executive director of the Graduate Students Association of Laurentian University, which represents 600 masters and doctorate students, said there has been a severe shortage of student housing in the city in the past two years. He said this situation has driven students into illegal rooming and boarding houses, where rents are high and the accommodation inadequate. He said a new residence at Laurentian University was full and students face difficulties in being housed off-campus.

“Some lived in tents in the back of the university grounds until they found a place,” Blondin said.

Under the first of two options being considered by the planning committee, staff proposed to allow locating these rooming and boarding house accommodations on sites with R3, R3-1 and R4 medium density housing zones next to primary roads and some secondary roads.

Paul Kusnierczyk, a New Sudbury resident, said the city should not expand rooming and boarding houses. He said police and bylaw officials already have trouble dealing with the noise and littering problems arising from illegal housing arrangements in the New Sudbury area.

After hearing opposition from many citizens, including Arthemise Camirand-Peterson, chair of the New Sudbury Community Action Network and Landry-Altmann, the planning committee voted against changing the bylaw provisions regarding rooming and boarding houses. Instead, they voted for a second option, which is to maintain the status quo.

“There is too much going on with this,” Frances Caldarelli, Ward 10 Coun., said. “Let us pass the zoning bylaw, but take out the section dealing with expanding rooming and boarding houses. We need to spend time with residents fist before we revisit this.”

Councillors from Wards 3 and 4, Claude Berthiaume and Evelyn Dutrisac, agreed. So did committee chair Coun. Andre Rivest, who argued that the best areas for students is on site at the post secondary institutions themselves. But the status quo still leaves the door open for developers to apply for a rezoning application.

“If you want a rooming house you can still come to the planning committee (on an individual basis),” Rivest said.

But the agreement was not unanimous.

Ward 9 Coun. Doug Craig sided with staff's recommendation. He said there had been enough consultation and the status quo was not good enough to deal with the lack of temporary housing accommodation.

Landry-Altmann argued for sticking with the status quo and instead said she would work in a committee over the next few months to ensure adequate licensing and enforcement of existing rooming and boarding houses, similar to what other cities have done, before there is any discussion of expansion.

For example, many citizens argued bylaw officers do not work past 5 p.m., or on the weekends, when most noise problems occur in rooming and boarding houses. In addition, they noted when police were called with their complaints their concerns were not given a high enough priority.


Comments

Verified reader

If you would like to apply to become a verified commenter, please fill out this form.