TOWARDS A NOVA SCOTIA HOUSING STRATEGY

Transcription

1 TOWARDS A NOVA SCOTIA HOUSING STRATEGY An Environmental Perspective It is against the background of a challenging environmental context that the Nova Scotia Government has set out to produce Nova Scotia's first housing strategy since This is a substantial movement as it is governments, especially the provincial government, that through their regulatory powers, their programs, and their own building initiatives, play a key role in defining the relationship between the built and natural environments. In turn, this helps determine how well our natural environment will be able to sustain us into the future. In Canada, provincial governments play the most important role in this regard either directly or through their responsibility for framing municipal powers. BEC believes that decreasing our environmental footprint must be one of the fundamental objectives of a new housing strategy for Nova Scotia. A strategy should start from a thorough understanding of the environmental impact of the way we build and locate residential buildings. Then it must move forward through an examination of best practices everywhere, to policies and programs that reduce humanities impact on the natural environment, tailored to the environmental opportunities and constraints particular to different parts of the province. In the Discussion Paper used in the Nova Scotia Housing Strategy s development process, the government articulates three things - the current housing situation, the faults and failures of this system and the possibility of a new framework. The Built Environment Committee (BEC) of the Ecology Action Centre (EAC) commends this. It also commends, the more holistic approach expressed in the Discussion Paper, by the department s intention to act as a catalyst for partnership and change, (and) to integrate housing with other government services. The Discussion Paper is framed mainly in terms of social and economic opportunities and constraints. Most participants in the current discussion process will no doubt also focus on these dimensions. However, the provincial housing strategy should be a much more comprehensive document. We are familiar with scientists warnings of impending environmental problems - the effects of some are already being felt. Because of our limited effort to forestall them, the most serious of these, climate change is escalating rapidly. Canadians are one of the highest per capita producers of greenhouse gases in the world. Our buildings - how we design, operate, and locate them - may be responsible for up to two thirds of our greenhouse gas production. In Nova Scotia how we house ourselves matters from a social, economic, and increasingly better understood, environmental perspective. The resources we use for our residential buildings - how building materials are produced and harvested, if and how we reuse older buildings and their materials when we demolish them, play a huge role. In addition to the built form itself, the land that urban sprawl takes from agriculture or from our forest carbon sinks, where we locate residential development in relation to places of work and the transportation needs that ensue, also impact our carbon footprint. None of these are included in the provincial housing Discussion Paper but should be to provide a complete picture of the situation. In recognition of this, we need to make a significant leap forward in our thinking and in our actions, from old ways of understanding how to solve housing problems to finding other ways that are grounded on a better understanding of the relationship between the natural and the built environment. BEC s focus is to develop a housing strategy based on a solid understanding of the relationship between the built and natural environments (on the environmental footprint of housing). The BEC recognizes that modifications to the current process will need to be made in order to

2 accommodate this perspective. Given the communities pressing housing needs, it is not feasible to adequately address all the environmental concerns in the short-term. Therefore, the BEC is suggesting both immediate and long-term strategies. BEC Recommendations In order to address both immediate needs and ensure that longer term approaches are environmentally well grounded, we suggest that the government treat the current strategy development process as Stage 1, An Affordable Housing Strategy, and commit to the design and implementation of a more comprehensive and environmentally grounded strategy as Stage 2, A Longer-Term Strategy. Stage 1 would include immediate actions. This would be as green as possible while still addressing immediate needs. Stage 1 should include defining terms of reference for Stage 2, as well as a description of how Stage 2 will be completed. In the Short Term: Address immediate needs. To address the immediate urgent housing needs, BEC would like the Nova Scotia Government: 1. To increase the supply of affordable residential units, but adding the requirement to whatever policies and programs are used, that these be as green as possible. This would include energy efficient, walkability, good connections to transit etc.i 2. To give priority to increasing the stock of affordable, healthy and environmentally friendly rental housing.ii 3. To make more efficient use of existing housing stock, of all ages it must be seen as part of the solution. It offers many opportunities e.g. secondary units (granny suites), better use of older homes etc. 4. To take immediate action to assist property owners to upgrade their housing units to reduce heating and water costs insulation, new windows, solar panels, heat pumps, dual function toilets, low flow showers, etc. Carefully directed new investment in the above initiatives will prove compatible with longerterm directions that could emerge from Stage 2. Stage 2 will involve a more environmentally grounded strategy. In the Longer Term To address the longer-term housing needs, BEC would like the Nova Scotia government to commit to another phase for the strategy development process. A provincial housing strategy should be more comprehensive and coherent than the one introduced by the Discussion Paper. The reduction of our environmental footprint should be a fundamental objective and that a competent analysis of the relationship between the natural and built environment be completed in order to understand how that objective could be achieved. We would hope that this Stage 2 process could proceed in parallel with the short-term implementation activities coming out of Stage 1.iii As defined during Stage 1, the terms of reference for Stage 2 will require: 1. To determine current housing needs and supply.iv 2. To assess whether rental or owned accommodation is usually more environmentally friendly. 3. To evaluate the root causes of current housing sector issues, identifying the market's failure as a mechanism to apportion housing according to need and according to the challenge of a sustainable future.v 4. To broaden the discussion of housing to include solar positioning. To encourage an enlargement of the discussion beyond houses and affordable rental accommodation to issues related to the location of housing such that Nova Scotian communities become more sustainable, environmentally, socially, and economically.vi 5. To assess the requirements for strengthening the government's ability to tackle

3 housing issues - including adding expertise in reducing the environmental footprint of the built environment within the framework of sustainable communities - and developing a plan to do so. 6. To assess the requirements for preventing the destruction of the diverse communities we already have, communities, which have the potential for increasing their environmentally friendly housing stock, with the help of community members. As part of this phase, the department of community services should arrive at a document that: 1. Clearly states its goals and objectives in a way that can be measured. It should also give precise, clear and concise explanations of the implementation methods with expected timelines attached.vii 2. Recognizes that now, in 2013, we are confronting new challenges for developing housing and communities not faced in the past, challenges of a significant environmental nature. 3. Provides a description of what the diverse, mixed communities described in the discussion paper would look like in Nova Scotia, physically, economically, and socially. 4. Clarifies the jurisdictions of provincial and municipal governments and includes a full discussion of municipalities as partners in its implementation.viii 5. Makes changes to the Building Code either as a part of the Housing Strategy or to accompany it. Changes that permit encourage and enforce more green design and building methods. In the mean time, make reasonable allowances to enable builders/renovators to make better use of our existing housing stock.ix 6. Moves discussion from design of eco-houses to design of multiple-unit buildings, econeighbourhoods and eco-communities to make use of district heating systems, neighbourhood power generation etc. 7. Examines whether the finance sector could be encouraged to go beyond its current green or eco-smart mortgages to individual homeowners and offer financing to developers that would encourage green multi-unit developments. 8. Examines whether there is a better system than the current land location-based property tax system. A tax on square footage, for example, irrespective of locationrelated land values, could reduce negative environmental and social impacts and also promote densification. 9. Examines how the Provincial and Municipal Governments can curtail urban sprawl. 10. Requires site design and street layout to maximize shelter from wind and access to solar; examining the issue of solar rights. 11. Provides incentives for developers to build to the best current green building standards and rewards those who have done the best community building.x 12. Creates incentives to reuse existing structures and for infill housing rather than to build new ones. 13. Uses visual images in Discussion Papers and reports that reflect Nova Scotia's realities or provide good examples of development that reflect a significantly reduced environmental footprint while achieving social and economic goals.xi The BEC would be pleased to participate in the suggested Stage 2 strategy development. Submitted by the Built Environment Committee of the Ecology Action Centre, one of the seven committees. If you have any questions, please contact Jen Powley, jlpowley@gmail.com or Endnotes If looked at comprehensively, the issues of housing are many and varied, which makes it

4 difficult to write a condense paper to respond to the concept of a Provincial Housing Strategy. Therefore, the following comments and endnotes are offered for greater clarification and additional information and ideas that could prove useful in the production of such a strategy. BEC encourages the government to study examples of communities and housing that are being built in harmony with the environment - reducing resources required and minimizing carbon and other toxic emissions. The Canadian research service, Muniscope, to which the Nova Scotia government contributes financial support, could no doubt provide helpful assistance in this regard. BEC offers the following examples and can offer more upon request: an article on a couple of innovative, energy-efficient houses in a working class neighborhood of Washington, D.C. where community members have been struggling with foreclosures given problems with American banking and finance systems that lead to families over-exposing themselves to credit risks associated with market failure. These houses, built at about the average cost of houses of a similar size on the market, produce almost all their own energy, a feat made simpler by the fact that they consume 90 percent less energy for heating and cooling than conventional houses. an article on a six-story building completely heated by passive solar in Seattle. A Dalhousie professor has modeled how to build and site a five-story building in Nova Scotia so that, given our climate, it can be heated completely by passive solar. Numbered endnotes i There are now many examples of low rise (6 stories or less), socially supportive and environmentally sustainable high density mixed development, often infill, contrasting with the socially and environmentally problematic high rise high density we continue to allow developers to create. ii Rentals are important because the average income of more than 50% of Nova Scotian s is well below the level that allows them reasonably to aspire to home ownership and for some that is the preferred form of housing. Government can do this through support for NGOs and cooperatives, working with these groups, on a by community basis. It could provide NGOs and cooperatives with loan guarantees, grants, and the technical expertise to build new sustainable residential accommodation as well as to rehabilitate heritage and other older buildings for mixed residential purposes. Making environmental sustainability a condition of assistance, combined with appropriate technical advice, should produce accommodation with reduced operational costs as well as reduced negative environmental impact. iii Stage 2 should be led by independent experts from outside government, as is the current rural economic development strategy process, and include those whose backgrounds will enable them to ensure appropriate analysis and recommendations for achieving the environmental footprint reduction objective. The experts could have a representative advisory group to act as a sounding board for their work. iv Who is over-housed and who is under-housed? What is the quality of our housing stock? How much of it is environmentally efficient or inefficient? How are housing needs and supply distributed spatially in Nova Scotia, and environmental opportunities and constraints? v Such an assessment should include these factors: a. The structure, operation, and profit levels of the for-profit engine that drives our development industry, limits our choices, and seems inflexible in the face of today's

5 environmental challenges. b. Reasons why we have been unable to guide patterns of urban land development and residential settlement in an environmentally sustainable manner. c. Market's limitations, both as an allocator of housing to meet needs and as a builder of sustainable communities. d. Role of property taxes based on the market, rising as the rich invade lower income areas, forcing those on lower incomes to sell their homes and move away. e. The increase in land values leading to speculative development and to property tax increases that disproportionately affect the poor (passed on to them by landlords if they are renters) f. The costs in terms of affordable housing and environmentally appropriate urban form of rich Nova Scotian s and out-of-province companies speculating on residential units and holding them empty in the centre of urban areas, forcing others to locate further from the centres. vi An example of location issues: Hammonds Plains may be affordable for families, but is not good environmentally. It builds on greenfield sites that have insufficient water and are auto dependent; whereas downtown is unaffordable for most people but environmentally more sustainable and less auto dependent. vii The Strategy should provide for progress to be tracked and social, economic, and environmental issues monitored to detect new housing sector challenges, helping ensure that Nova Scotia adjusts its interventions appropriately to meet them. viii Currently there seems to be some confusion. HRM seems to believe that housing is not within its mandate. Municipal Land-Use Bylaws determine minimum lot sizes, permissible subdivisions and new development requirements. The government should encourage better collaboration between the two levels of government and ensure that problems needing solution don't fall between the cracks, along with the people needing more affordable housing. ix The building code plays a large role in how buildings are used. Current standards often don t allow new, more sustainable building techniques, or an alteration in the number of units inside a building, nor require that renovations be energy efficient, etc. All of which affects the affordability of the building and how environmentally sustainable it is. Bring in stronger and more extensive regulations on energy efficiency requirements. x There are those in the development industry who would build residential accommodation and communities which are environmentally sustainable and which provide for the needs of all, but they need the rules of the game to be changed to encourage them. xi In other words, they should avoid the kind of images used in the current Discussion Paper which depict the same sterile high rise/suburban car-dependent dichotomy the development industry is set up to produce and has been producing for years.