The real kicker is with so much government-backed housing now coming online, some rents may be dropping but your taxes will keep rising.
In B.C., the province’s 2023 budget pledged $4.3 billion for subsidized housing, equal to the entire provincial deficit, after the province had announced a separate $500 million fund to help non-profits buy old rental buildings. This is addition to $428 million aimed at those “currently homeless or unstably housed” in the 2022 provincial budget.
But, as the parliamentary budget office noted, there is no standard government definition of affordable housing. And, in B.C., no one knows how many homeless there are, or if the programs meant to house them are making any difference.
Questions regarding provincial government spending and accountability has led to a forensic audit of BC Housing, the provincial housing agency. Conducted and complete last year by Ernest Young under orders from B.C. Premier and former housing minister David Eby, the potentially explosive audit has yet to be released.
B.C. currently has 70,000 subsidized housing units in 3,200 non-profit buildings and the number is mushrooming as billions of dollars pump in from taxpayers.
The big winners, however, appear to be politicians queuing for the spending announcements and registered housing charities with multimillion-dollar payrolls.
Losers include the innocent living in old hotels converted to house the homeless, where violence and other crime is a constant threat.
https://www.westerni...g-in-bc-6738122
Edited by Victoria Watcher, 10 June 2025 - 09:11 PM.