Housing industry partners meet with mayor of Quebec City
The Association de la construction du Québec (ACQ), the Association des professionnels de la construction et de l'habitation du Québec (APCHQ), the Corporation des propriétaires immobiliers du Québec (CORPIQ) and the Urban Development Institute of Québec (UDI) met with the Mayor of Quebec City, Bruno Marchand, to discuss the municipality's vision for housing. In this area, the City of Quebec shares the opinion that it is necessary to complete an objective inventory in order to lay the foundations for an action plan with all the players: municipalities, the provincial government, the federal government, the community sector, the private sector and civil society.
"I would like to thank the industry partners and invite them to continue their efforts so that an inventory can be made of the situation throughout Quebec. Through its vision of housing, Quebec City is committed to offering a variety of housing types in quality, safe and sustainable living environments that meet the needs of citizens throughout the territory, especially those of families. Our demands to the Quebec government are clear, including the addition of 500 affordable and social housing units per year reserved specifically for Quebec City and financial support for our land bank to create sustainable neighborhoods," said Bruno Marchand, Mayor of Quebec City.
"Like many cities in Quebec, Quebec City has a major housing problem with a vacancy rate of 1.6%. Faced with this situation, the City has chosen to act by focusing on a global approach that goes beyond the building, but which takes into account the human being and his living environment. We believe that these are interesting orientations to curb the crisis," emphasize the spokespeople for the housing industry partners Guillaume Houle of the ACQ, Maxime Rodrigue of the APCHQ, Marc-André Plante of CORPIQ and Jean-Marc Fournier of the IDU.
The need for concerted action
While the housing shortage is responsible for soaring rental housing prices and the difficulty of accessing home ownership, the only way to reduce overheating in a sustainable way is to increase supply. The housing industry partners want to work with Quebec's municipal leaders to find solutions to further stimulate housing construction and review the many mechanisms that are holding back housing starts.
"In order to improve the supply situation and establish a long-term vision to get out of the crisis, we believe that all players in the housing sector must roll up their sleeves and look in the same direction to find solutions that will increase and accelerate the development of new housing units. The voice and role of the municipalities in this regard seem to be essential to us " say the industry partners.
Towards a national housing action plan
Since the municipal world is faced with critical housing issues without an adequate source of funding, the partners believe that the various levels of government must jointly conduct an objective examination of the challenges and issues that are responsible for the crisis in the housing sector.
In order to respond to the housing shortage in all regions of Quebec, the four organizations maintain that this joint diagnosis is essential to enable government authorities at all levels to develop a real action plan in which their respective actions will be complementary and coherent. Armed with these objective facts and this plan, government authorities will be able to bring together all the social and economic players to rise to the housing challenge.
