Okotoks has reached a critical state with its need for affordable housing, according to a local service group.
The Okotoks United Church provides dollars to local residents who struggle to make ends meet for rent, mortgage payments, gas and utilities, or grocery bills on a one-off basis, through its Benevolent Fund, which is made up of donations from congregation members.
In November alone, nearly $5,000 was given to people in need in the community.
Church representative Dean Salter, who sits on the Okotoks Affordable Housing Task Force, said the numbers aren’t getting any better through December.
“It’s an ongoing thing,” said Salter. “It just underlines how difficult the situation is, because there’s very little affordable housing. Rental accommodation is just nil or very little, and what is available is too expensive for a lot of people.”
He said the most difficult part is these issues tend to snowball. When people lose their jobs or move from a dual to a single income it can get tough to make payments and afford a place to live.
It doesn’t help there isn’t much available in the first place, he said.
“There’s very little rental accommodation in here and there hasn’t been purpose-built rental accommodation built here in a long time,” said Salter.
He said the conversation around affordable housing issues in town began to surface at the Okotoks United Church three years ago, and in 2017 the church board wrote a letter to Town council outlining its concerns and the need for a strategic plan around affordable housing.
The Town responded by striking up the Affordable Housing Task Force in 2018, and it’s been working full speed ahead since then, he said.
“We’re getting fairly close to a strategic action plan and sometime in the first quarter of 2020 it should be available,” said Salter. “Affordable housing is critical and we need to address that and get very serious about affordable housing in town here.”
Julia Kimmett, pastor of the Okotoks United Church, said the situation is becoming dire and it’s evident in the requests for Benevolent Fund help.
“They can either afford housing or food, that’s what we hear a lot,” said Kimmett. "These are coming in regularly now, these requests. But we are limited as well.”
She said the needs they’ve seen are just the tip of the iceberg, because not everyone is being directed to the United Church for help. There are some people who are living with their families because they’ve lost their own homes or can’t afford to live on their own, she said.
Sometimes its single moms with children who are living with their parents, she said.
“It’s fortunate they have people to live with, but that is a definition of homeless as well – people who are couch-surfing or living with family because they can’t afford housing for themselves,” said Kimmett. “So I would say there’s a really significant lack of affordable housing – and I’m not saying low-income housing, just affordable housing.”
In Okotoks the going rate for a three or four-bedroom home to suit a family is between $1,800 and $2,400 per month, she said. That’s out of reach for a lot of people in this economy, she said.
At a convention in Sherwood Park earlier this month the topic of affordable housing was a hot one, she said. People are talking about crisis situations as they lose their jobs and are inching closer to losing their homes as well, she said.
“There’s a huge percentage who are just really one paycheque away from not being able to afford their homes,” said Kimmett. “It’s sad.”
She said the Affordable Housing Task Force is doing important work to try to inform the Town on what is needed in Okotoks.
However, she said it’s going to take a village to fix the deeper-rooted problems.
The solutions need to come from the private sector and Okotoks citizens, from developers willing to build affordable multi-family units, she said.
With 60 per cent of the provincial budget spent on healthcare and the balance going toward things like education, recreation and roads, it’s tough to continue to ask for more help, she said.
“The government is maxed out, too,” said Kimmett. “We need better solutions. We all have to come together and find solutions, and I believe that churches and private citizens and government and the private sector, business, we all have to come together and set a different direction.”
“But if we can put some of our resources not into Band-Aid solutions but more permanent solutions for people, if there’s a will for that in the community then we have to work towards that, otherwise it’s just going to get worse.”
