Forty modular housing structures lie in shrink wrap at the rear of a Penticton, B.C., storage yard where they have been for more than a year. The province says they will soon be moved to Vernon to provide 52 units of supportive housing.Kerry Gold/The Globe and Mail
In a storage lot in Penticton, B.C., there are 40 modular housing structures stored in shrink wrap, rows of them to the rear of a development site. Soon, the province says, the units will be transported to a site in Vernon where they will finally, after years of storage, be used as their intended purpose, as 52 units of supportive housing.
There are currently about 195 modular structures in storage, according to BC Housing. They are part of a modular program launched in 2017 by the province to expedite supportive and affordable housing for seniors and families without homes and at risk of homelessness. In an e-mailed response, the province said “the majority” of those structures in storage are “earmarked for projects to be deployed in 2025.”
The 40 structures stored in Penticton have been there for almost two years, and BC Housing has paid a private developer landowner to store them. They also paid to have the units remediated after sitting unused for so long. The homes were built in 2022, but the project they were planned for fell through, so they wound up in limbo.
When it was launched, the idea was that factory-built modular housing could reduce the timeline for urgently needed housing and municipalities would fast-track permitting. It seemed a viable solution to a growing demand. But that efficiency hasn’t gone as planned, according to some, and the housing crisis has become even more dire, and more frustrating, for those trying to fix it.
The Penticton units are bound for Vernon, to be turned into 52 units run by non-profit housing provider Turning Points. They have waited three years for the units. They were long-time owners of the land at 2307 W. 43rd St., prior to selling it to BC Housing, and the foundation is built and ready for completion. The group has projects in smaller communities where homelessness is often under the radar, with few supports, including Vernon, West Kelowna, Kelowna, Summerland, Enderby and a project under way in Osoyoos.
The holdup in getting the modular homes built is partly due to higher overall costs and supply challenges that came out of the pandemic and continue to thwart progress, said Turning Points chief executive officer Randene Wejr.
“It is absolutely frustrating. And even for the funders [BC Housing], it is … because these processes, they don’t want them to take as long. And for us, you know, seeing that people are unhoused or living in their cars, these types of situations, of course it’s frustrating.”
The foundation has been poured at 43rd St., in Vernon, and awaits the 40 units modular units.Turning Points Collaborative Society
The fastest-growing groups facing homelessness, said Ms. Wejr, are seniors and families. Corrina Bowers, 22, dropped out of college to take care of her mother, Robin Lessard, who is terminally ill. The family, including teenage sister Jazper, have been evicted from their Vernon apartment and must leave by the end of the month. Some tenants took the landlord’s offer of a payout to leave while others took him to arbitration, said Ms. Bowers. They ultimately lost, and Ms. Bowers and her family are the only remaining tenants in the building, she said.
The three of them would take a two-bedroom, she said, but they can’t find anything they can afford. Their current rent is around $1,000, far lower than market rate, and Ms. Lessard, a single mom, has been ill and unable to work for a few years, said Ms. Bowers.
They fear homelessness, but they’ve raised around $4,000 through GoFundMe, so that will buy them some time.
“Thankfully, we’re going to be able to afford like a month in a hotel and then go from there,” said Ms. Bowers.
She has applied to BC Housing, but the waiting lists for affordable housing are long.
Ms. Wejr said these cases of “economic” homelessness are growing.
“You know, we truly did believe in modular housing, because it comes together quickly. And our first one did. It was 2019, right before COVID. So, we didn’t have the trades issues. We didn’t have … the supply chain issues, any of that stuff. There was nothing. So, we had a 52-unit modular supportive housing complex built within less than two years.”
The city of Vancouver’s modular housing program also started off with huge promise when it was announced by then-mayor Gregor Robertson’s city council. But citing costs, council members who are part of the ABC party, which now dominates city council, have said modular no longer makes sense. Last year the city dismantled the four-year-old modular unit Larwill Place to make way for the new Vancouver Art Gallery, which was then postponed. Before that, the 46-unit modular complex at the Little Mountain site at E. 37th Avenue was dismantled after providing housing for three years. The acreage, mostly empty for 17 years, is owned by Holborn Development. There are 11 temporary modular housing buildings still standing, with almost 700 units, according to the city.
Former city councillor Jean Swanson, a well-known anti-poverty activist, embraced modular housing as part of the solution, and she believes it’s still a viable option. She estimates there are about 10,000 units of housing “desperately needed” for people who can only afford around $500 per month. That includes people on the supportive housing wait list, people who are homeless and people who are living in substandard homes, such as single-room occupancy hotel room units.
“We desperately need those modulars. The other thing about the modulars is people love them. They’re so much better than SROs. They have bathrooms. They have kitchens. They are three times as big as an SRO. People feel like they’ve won the lottery when they get in them,” Ms. Swanson says.
“Now they’re saying that these things cost too much to dismantle, that they’re expensive, you know, the process to install them and take them down and move them. Well, wasn’t that factored in when they first came up with this plan?”
Last fall, mayors from Burnaby, Prince George, Penticton, Nanaimo and Williams Lake met in Kelowna and announced a task force to fast-track modular home construction and help with the affordable housing crisis. Non-profit group Modular BC said modular construction took a hit like everything because of the pandemic, but the industry needs the support of government to build the sector, said co-director of Modular BC, Paul Binotto. He couldn’t speak to the unused modulars sitting in storage, but he said no one should write-off modular as a key part of the solution to the crisis.
“I think if we create more demand specific to modular, we will create more investment in modular in our province, we will create more manufacturing jobs, more opportunity for B.C., and we can create an industry not only to solve our problems, but we could help others.”
Ms. Wejr added that the biggest obstacle is getting people to demand change.
“Until we as a society truly believe that people who are unhoused – like our seniors and families living in poverty, people living with addictions and mental health issues – until we believe they deserve safe and affordable housing, these changes are going to continue to be slow to make a dent in affordable housing anyway.”