The Caring Place room was abuzz as more than 30 secondary suite landlords came together with anti-poverty activists to offer ideas on how to match landlords and tenants and what resources would make that job easier.
The event marked the launch of Richmond Rental Connect, a pilot project sponsored by the Richmond Poverty Response Committee (PRC) aimed at addressing the shortage of affordable housing in Richmond.
The evening featured two guest speakers: Dena Kae Beno, the city's affordable housing coordinator, who spoke about the instrumental role of secondary suites in the city's affordable housing strategy; and Jabeen Janmohamed, BC Housing's manager of home adaptations for independence, who spoke on programs that provide funding to retrofit homes so seniors can age in place.
After the guest speakers, participants split into three conversation circles led by trained facilitators from the Richmond Civic Engagement Network who encouraged fruitful discussion.
Rental Connect wants to know the concerns of landlords, what challenges they face, what motivates them and what supports would be useful.
Ideas that immerged were thoughtful and surprising. Although landlords were concerned about ensuring they get good tenants, they also saw the benefit of having someone reliable living in part of their home if they want to go on vacation or need help around the property. And although people agreed the income would be nice, they also acknowledged that renting out a secondary suite could enable them to stay in their own neighbourhood when they retired and not have to move away or downsize.
The final consensus was that while many landlords want to provide more housing options for renters, in order to do so they need supports and resources such as workshops, website links, mentorship, bylaw information and ways to resolve issues before they get out of hand.
The second community engagement event is a Tenant Town Hall conversation circle. This event is on Thursday May 31 at the Richmond Pentecostal Church from 6 p.m. to 8.30 p.m. Light dinner and refreshments and translation services are offered. Renters can register by contacting 604-205-4700 or [email protected].
The next phase of the project will be a website launch on June 20 where landlords and tenants can view what their feedback looks like when the website goes live. More news on this and feedback from the tenant town hall will be in upcoming articles.
De Whalen is a longtime poverty and affordable housing activist in Richmond.
