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By Liam Verster

Affordable Housing Agreement

Agreement made for affordable housing project in Vernon

Aug 14, 2025 | 2:08 PM

A new affordable housing project can go ahead in Vernon, pending funding.

Vernon city council received a report on the proposed development on Okanagan Landing Road, next to Marshall Fields, at the regular meeting Monday, Aug. 11.

The project, proposed by the Okanagan Village Housing Society, will see a six-storey, 101-unit development at the 0.8 hectare property. Of those units, 20 per cent would be “deep subsidy” for people with incomes below the threshold established by B.C. Housing, 50 per cent would be reserved for people with low to moderate incomes, and 30 per cent would be middle-income units.

Council had previously voiced support for this project, and at the meeting Monday voted unanimously in favour of coming to an agreement with the non-profit Okanagan Village Housing Society and providing $519,135.38 to cover the municipal development cost charges.

Those funds, provided through the Affordable Housing Reserve, would equate to waiving the DDCs for 70 per cent of the units, with the report noting the final 30 per cent of the units would not meet the criteria for having those waived.

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The Affordable Housing Reserve will be left with a total of roughly $50,000 after this approval. It is topped up annually with $75,000 from the casino revenues, and city staff noted this could be modified to see more money injected into the reserve through this funding stream, or find another funding source in the future if needed.

Though the agreement was supported by council on Monday, that does not mean the project will be going ahead immediately, as Mayor Victor Cumming said the non-profit was still seeking provincial funding.

“Once they have the funding, then we’ll see the project, I suspect, move quickly to the building permit stage,” the mayor told Vernon Matters.

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