OctOber 2016 BCBusiness 73
public land ideally suited for affordable housing is being
sold off at record rates. as british columbians struggle to
cope with the highest housing costs in the nation, is it time
for governments to rethink their cash-grab strategy?
■ ■ b y K e r r y G o l d
The GreaT
Canadian
Fire sale
i
ngrid Steenhuisen was an infant when she
and her family moved into their 750-square-
foot unit at Vancouver's Little Mountain—also
known as "the projects." But Steenhuisen
didn't think of her home as low-income housing
that would, over the decades, earn a reputation
as the rundown and ugly-looking complex o‚
Main Street, at 155 East 37th Avenue.
Little Mountain—one of Canada's oldest
social housing projects—was a joint e‚ort by
the three levels of government that opened in
1954. Operated by the Canada Mortgage and
Housing Corporation (
CMHC), the 37 buildings and 224
multifamily housing units were "lled with kids just like
Steenhuisen—playing in the grassy oasis that was the big
lawn surrounded by their apartment buildings, hidden
away from passersby. They had it good, their community
of nearly 700 people, even though they were, to outsid-
ers, considered poor kids.
