Only two years into their 10-year timeline to welcome 3,800 new residential units, the City of Greater Sudbury has already hit the 30 per cent mark.
Between 2022 and 2023, 1,132 new residential units were created in Greater Sudbury, including 457 units in 2022 and 675 units in 2023.
During her presentation to city council earlier last week, city senior planner Melissa Riou cited this figure, which includes a handful of housing types the province does not currently factor into the targets it has ascribed to municipalities.
The province’s definition follows CMHC housing start numbers, which counts new foundations, and excludes property conversions and secondary units. These numbers exclude long-term care beds and retirement homes.
Under CMHC numbers, the city is at approximately 20 per cent of its 10-year provincially set housing target.
“The city tracks the number of new residential units for which it has issued a building permit, including secondary units and building conversions that result in the creation of new units,” a city spokesperson clarified to Sudbury.com.
“This number, included in the presentation to council, differs from the provincial tracker.”
The spokesperson also cited the provincial tracker website, which notes, “Other housing types that have been enabled and encouraged by provincial policies — which could include basement and laneway suites, long-term care homes and student housing — will be added to this tracker in the coming months.”
Riou’s report also noted the city has enough land to accommodate 95 years of growth.
“There’s still that need to ensure we have proper alignment with our servicing, but all in all we’re sitting pretty comfortably in terms of land supply,” she said.
“Supply is not an issue in Greater Sudbury,” city planning services director Kris Longston later added.
“There is a significant amount of lots or units that are already draft-approved, so right now it’s on the onus of the developer to move forward, do the engineering, design work and things required to bring those units online.”
The residential land supply includes 4,326 potential units within draft-approved subdivisions, 1,035 vacant legal lots of record (10,624 potential units), and 665 lots of designated developable lands within the settlement boundary.
Now, the trick will be getting developers to build on these properties.
Following up on last year’s successful motion to freeze development charges rather than proceed with a 9.9 per cent increase, Ward 4 Coun. Pauline Fortin reiterated the sentiment that doing away with development charges might spur development.
“I would love it if we could look at maybe dropping development charges on row homes and semi-detached homes, because I think that’s a sweet spot,” she said, later adding that the goal would be “to get a bunch of homes built that people can afford and will attract people to our city.”
A recent Housing Supply and Demand Analysis report prepared for the city by N. Barry Lyon Consultants Ltd. clarified that although more housing is needed in general, the most immediate deficit is with affordable housing.
No associated motion came with Fortin’s suggestion regarding eliminating certain development charges, but the city is currently drafting a new development charges bylaw expected to reach council chambers in the coming months.
Tyler Clarke covers city hall and political affairs for Sudbury.com.
