Editorial: United on housing

By DRIFTWOOD STAFF

June 11, 2025

You can always spot the born helpers, because they don’t ever stop helping.

The Gulf Islands Senior Residence Association (GISRA) was founded to create

affordable homes for seniors; adapting now to launch a project most likely to help young

families is frankly everything you’d expect from GISRA’s long-dedicated board

members.

If residents of Salt Spring could be said to agree on anything, it’s that the island needs

more affordable places to live, and more doctors to keep us healthy. Both of those goals

could be advanced by GISRA’s planned 50-unit affordable housing project at Kings

Lane, which still needs a significant dose of funding — predicated in part upon changing

the land’s zoning.

The Local Trust Committee has signalled it supports GISRA’s plan, which would make

50 previously approved seniors-only units available to anyone who needs affordable

housing, and increase the number of doctors permitted in the adjacent clinic; trustees

asked staff to prioritize GISRA’s application.

And as GISRA’s circle of care grows, we’ve seen a hopeful unanimity among local

officials to help the helpers; kudos are due to our Local Community Commission and

CRD Director, for stepping up with promises of support and funding.

In the event the rezone happens, GISRA still has a massive task ahead of it to prepare an

application to BC Housing for support through the province’s Community Housing

Fund. That funding stream is aimed squarely at affordable rental homes, non-profit

society applicants and public/private partnerships. It seems almost tailor-made for

GISRA’s project, and we hope BC Housing agrees.

It was just on May 30 that guidelines for funding applications were released — and it’s a

“rolling” request for proposals, meaning they will take applications until the money is

gone. Time indeed matters, and local elected officials in every “silo” of our island

governance seem aligned.

Also: this is the second time in months our local Islands Trust staff have been tasked

with a “rush” job on a rezoning; the last, an effort to beat a deadline for the Lady Minto

Hospital Foundation’s Bittancourt project, was also a matter of growing our housing

stock, and also related to improving healthcare here. Those staff deserve our thanks as

well.