“Meek and mild.” With those two words, Mayor Kennedy Stewart clinched Council’s support for his once failed and now resurrected Making Home plan.

This time around, the Mayor’s tactic was to simply be agreeable during the Jan. 26 Council meeting and let other Councillors fill in the many missing blanks from his motion to allow 2,000 homeowners build up to six houses on their lots.

Behind the scenes, in the weeks leading up to the meeting however, Mayor Stewart had been aggressively promoting his plan (some UKRA members reported receiving robo-calls and last-minute emails from the Mayor).  According to CityHallWatch, the Mayor “received data collection for his re-election campaign via his campaign website linked to this Making Home motion.” 

 At Wednesday’s meeting Council members began juggling ideas and making amendments during the meeting — and there were plenty of them. “Nothing is carved in stone,” the Mayor said, noting that he was taking a “meek and mild” approach to the motion. It was a stark departure from 2020 when Mayor Stewart broke into a discussion on Cllr. Lisa Dominato’s Missing Middle motion, foisting his barely known Making Home plan on an unprepared Council.

Although when Cllr. Sarah Kirby-Yung suggested to replace “up to 2,000 lots” with “2,000 lots” for the pilot program, Mayor Stewart, a staunch, development supporter, disagreed in a surprise to many, saying it would lead to a “Vision Vancouver” style plan to “densify the whole city.”

The looming 2022 election was not far from most Councillors’ minds. Cllr. Colleen Hardwick was critical of Mayor Stewart for launching a splashy Making Home website and radio ads she called his “marketing campaign.” Cllr. Hardwick was leery of Making Home, doubting it would result in affordable prices for middle-income earners, because, she said, adding six strata units on a single lot would inflate land values. “It would have exactly the opposite effect.” She was also concerned about the loss of character housing.

Cllr. Adriane Carr was the first to make an amendment that sought to retain character housing and incentivize renovations over demolition. Cllr. Christine Boyle, meanwhile, who has closely aligned herself with youth and young families during her term on Council, made an uncharacteristic amendment to strengthen accessibility requirements and incentives or flexibility in FSR to create fully accessible ground-oriented units for seniors.

It was a long, drawn out meeting that produced 18 amendments, each severed into separate votes and passing by a majority vote of Councillors, with Cllrs. Hardwick and De Genova in opposition to most. Cllr. De Genova, objecting to Mayor Stewart’s consideration of reducing floor-space ratio for single-detached homes, saying it could result in a down-zoning of property values, voted against most of the amendments.

Mayor Stewart thanked Council and said there will be “a lot of eyes on us,” as Vancouver becomes the first Canadian city to embrace such a plan. If approved, Council will have to take a wait-and-see approach to how effective, and how affordable the plan will be.

Now that the motion has passed the initial phase of approval, it will be sent to staff to set guidelines and develop policies before returning to Council for final approval. 

Below are some of the amendments that passed at the meeting:

• On the consideration to limit floor space ratio for single detached homes, Cll. Pete Fry added: “respecting multi-generational, communal, and collective living. “
• Cllr. Kirby-Yung asked staff to consider “well-sized, larger spaces for families.” Kirby-Yung also asked staff to study what would compel current homeowners to take part in the project, and who would undertake such a project. As well, she asked for an annual report on policy outcomes.
• Cllr. Swanson asked staff to strengthen the Tenant Relocation and Protection Policy for this project.
• Staff were also directed to consider making three of the six units affordable for those families earning under 80k per year, and under $50k for singles.
• Cllr. Swanson asked that the pilot consider making more of the target area on the cheaper Eastside, and consider how the plan will be distributed city-wide.