AG says new housing units coming to Corner Brook may not be enough with hundreds on a waitlist

Denise Hanrahan tabled a report with government yesterday on the management and supply of social rental housing which found the waitlist for housing grew 71 percent since 2021 while inventory dropped by 57 units.

NL’s Auditor General Denise Hanrahan  tabled a report with government yesterday on the management and supply of social rental housing. Her office found that the 4000 person waitlist for housing grew 71 percent since 2021 while inventory dropped by 57 units. As well, 87 percent of the need is for one or two bedroom apartments and no units were remodeled to meet these needs during the same four year period. Hanrahan says a failure to forecast left the Corporation poorly equipped to plan for future supply and need. She says it started out as 1523 households when the audit started in 2021 and ended up being 2603 at the end. 

Hanrahan says this has created a problem of more demand with a lack of supply. There are 5248 units occupied,  222 vacant, and 72 are not available to rent, which Hanrahan says is actually around the same size of inventory during the last audit in 2008

Last July, a $2.6M contract was awarded for a building with six one-bedroom units in Corner Brook. In January, another contract worth $9.6M was awarded to create a three-story building in the city with ten one-bedroom and ten two-bedroom units. Hanrahan says this is good news but may not be enough. She says units in Corner Brook and Stephenville are 42-44 years old and it’s been over ten years since anything was built and there are 300-450 households on the waitlist. 

In her report, the AG has made a number of recommendations including the creation of waitlist policies, a long term, multi-year unit supply plan, and updated inspection and maintenance policies.