While the provincial government is championing the growth of housing construction, municipalities are expected to play catch up for the foreseeable future. Photovs | Dreamstime.com

By Adrian St.Onge

Housing in Medicine Hat and area still playing catch up, experts say

Aug 19, 2024 | 5:40 PM

Medicine Hat and other southeastern Alberta municipalities are issuing more building permits as they face the same housing shortage challenges that nearly every city and town across Canada is dealing with.

The Alberta government has seen some success trying to tackle the issue head on, with over 4,300 housing permits being issued last month alone.

City of Brooks manager of community development Lisa Tiffin said the city has issued significantly more permits year to date to address concerns and has gone so far to recommend other developers visit neighboring townships.

“If we don’t have that within our policies, or we don’t really have that worked into our land use bylaw, that’s not to say that Taber doesn’t or Bow Island or Dutchess or any of these other communities,” Tiffin said.

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“They [other towns] might be very successful at it and I personally don’t want to chase away any housing developers.”

To try and incentivize businesses and help solve current housing issues, the city has issued over a dozen more permits this year in comparison to 2023.

Eli J. Ridder/CHAT News

Selena McLean-Moore, executive director of Medicine Hat Economic Development, said that the attempt to expand and build more is not something that’s soon to change.

“This housing crisis is being seen all across Canada. The federal government has responded through the Housing Accelerator Fund which there have been communities in Alberta that have been successful,” McLean-Moore said.

“It’s just the beginning of what we’re going to see going forward and so I’m not surprised at all to see the numbers.“

Tiffin and McLean-Moore both said aggressively incentivizing businesses and developers are direct reasons for the sudden boom, which has led to some headway.

Still, both municipalities said that more time is needed to see the projects through effectively and that only time will tell how effective the programs have been,

With no anticipated changes in programming, every municipality in southeastern are playing the same game: catch up.

“From the time that you make that initial contact with a developer that you’re trying to attract until a time when that house is ready for occupancy, it’s not overnight and people are pretty desperate,” Tiffin said.

“They’re looking for solutions right away, because there’s a lot of overcrowding, there’s people living in hotels. We’re in crisis mode, but unfortunately, it’s just a slow process, and it takes a long time.”

To date, Brooks has issued 165 permits for various housing solutions, while Medicine Hat has issued 114 so far this year, 16 more than they issued in all of 2023.