N.S. changes bylaw to boost development, but critics doubt it will increase affordability

A construction worker wearing a hard hat assembles a frame with a nail gun for a house under construction.

The province has announced changes to bylaws aimed at increasing what can be built, but experts warn that it won’t help with creating affordable housing.

“We still will not acknowledge the facts that the cost of an apartment or a house in this province is still burdened by regulatory administrative fees and everything else,” said Duncan Williams, president of the Construction Association of Nova Scotia.

The new regulations aim to remove some barriers, including certain municipal rules, and allow for alternative housing options like container homes and developments in previously restricted areas.

Industry experts caution that the real issue is cost. They say taxes on new developments remain too high.

“We have a deed-transfer tax in Nova Scotia that’s higher than anywhere else in the country. It’s 1.5 per cent of the retail purchase price of a home or condo. That’s not mortgageable, you have to pay that up front and that amount is equal to a down payment for a home,” said Williams.

With these costs in mind, Williams said a number of projects in the province are currently at risk.

“If we don’t start to peel back some of these costs, we’re going to see the divide between affordability and availability continue, and they’re both different,” he said. “Like in Toronto, three thousand units are sitting empty and unattainable.”

The city of Halifax is at odds with the province, about rules they feel are being imposed rather than negotiated collaboratively.

“I understand what the province is trying to do. But I don’t agree with the methods [and] the way they’re going about it,” said Councillor Lisa Blackburn.

Blackburn also expressed concerns that the new regulations won’t address broader issues like infrastructure or the ongoing labour and material shortages. “I do worry about what announcements like these will mean for those big overarching plans that we have in motion, like transportation and climate change.”

Williams said this is not a time for government to go head to head, instead he said they should be working on solutions at the table, alongside members of the industry.

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