Quesnel City Council has given conditional approval for a supportive housing project on Elliott Street in West Quesnel.
Third reading was given to the proposal at last night’s meeting.
The vote was 6-1 in favour with Councillor Shushil Thapar opposed…
“I do support the project but i have concerns around the location, how BC Housing selected the location by the school. My concern is around the school children. To me they are naive and young enough not to know, not to see these things so i can’t support building the facility right by the school, so that’s a concern. And also i have a concern who’s going to run it, because that is still not final, so i can’t support if i don’t know who’s going to run it, because that makes a difference too.”
Quesnel Mayor Bob Simpson, while voting in favour, noted that he too has an accountability question if something goes wrong…
My answer to that question would be we need to get that right in the housing agreement and in the good neighbour agreement so that we have tools to try and figure out how to get that right, so that our community doesn’t have to concern itself that we take a 32-unit supportive transition housing facility and it’s poorly run, the public sector investment in that is not well maintained and managed, and the kind of service delivery there causes problems in the community at large.”
The housing agreement with BC Housing and the good neighbour agreement with the operator are still needed before final approval for the project can take place.
The proposal is for a 32-unit facility with space for staff and programming on the first floor.
Drop-in services and the homeless shelter components have been removed.
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