With leases set to expire, B.C. urged to keep modular housing units in Vancouver

A former Vancouver councillor is urging the B.C. government to retain temporary modular housing units to alleviate the city’s housing crisis.

Jean Swanson, a one-term councillor from 2018 to 2022 with the Coalition of Progressive Electors, told CTV News these affordable housing options need to be maintained.

"If these modular housing units aren't preserved, the people from those units will take up all the social housing that's in the works and we won't be able to make a dent in homelessness,” she said. “That's why I think it's so important that we get on top of this."

Swanson’s concerns come as some temporary modular housing leases are set to expire, including the lease for Larwill Place in downtown Vancouver, which contains 98 studio homes in two buildings.

The site is marked for the expansion of the new Vancouver Art Gallery, which is slated to open in 2027.

"That was always the expectation, that Larwill would be the construction site for the future art gallery,” said Coun. Pete Fry. “That's the nature of temporary modular housing.”

In September 2017, the province announced a funding commitment of $66 million toward building 600 units of temporary modular housing in Vancouver.

Fry said there are currently around 700 temporary modular housing units on 11 city-owned sites as well as privately-owned land. The leases typically last five years, he added, and there’s been keen interest to build more of these residences while people wait for permanent housing.

“We recognize that this is the last resort of housing for a lot of folks. We don't have replacements in mind necessarily so we have to have some kind of solution for folks who are living in these units as we move them on," Fry said.

Those replacements, according to the province, will be lease renewals and permanent housing. Housing Minister Ravi Kahlon wouldn’t specify how many leases are expiring, only that negotiations with BC Housing are underway.

"Our priority for sure is to make sure that residents that are in the modular housing have a place to go if the lease expires and that work is happening right now with BC Housing," Kahlon said.

The minister told CTV News that over the next few months, there will be an additional 820 housing units, about 230 of which will be temporary.