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British Columbia is in the grips of a housing affordability crisis decades in the making. The Province has an ambitious plan to tackle the crisis through the largest investment in housing affordability in B.C.’s history. Tasked with building tens of thousands of homes in hundreds of communities is BC Housing, the agency responsible for developing, managing, and administering a wide range of subsidized housing and homelessness services across the province. BC Housing doesn’t do this alone, they work with hundreds of partners. In this podcast, you’ll hear from those tackling the crisis head on.
A home. It's something we all need.
But for too many, having a safe place
to make a home is out of reach.
The challenges can seem insurmountable.
And yet, each and every day,
people are coming together
to provide safe, quality and affordable
housing for those in need.
Welcome to Let's Talk Housing.
I'm your host, Mita Naidu.
Join us as we listen to
and learn from people in British
Columbia who are creating strong,
inclusive communities where everyone can thrive.
Hello and welcome to season
five of Let's Talk Housing.
I'm your host, Mita Naidu.
As we begin today's podcast episode,
I'd like to acknowledge that I'm recording
from the unceded and unsurrended
land of the Halkomelem
speaking peoples.
Also for transparency,
this episode is being recorded
in January of 2025
and reflects the issues
and priorities of that time.
Today, on Let's Talk
Housing, we are joined by Brad McCannell,
VP of Access and Inclusion
at the Rick Hansen Foundation.
Doug Tennant, CEO of UNITI,
and Jewels Cressman, Community Advocate.
We'll be talking about accessible housing
and its importance
and impact in community.
This is Let's Talk Housing.
I'd like to open the conversation
by hearing a bit about what
inspired each of you
to focus on accessible housing.
What brought you to this place?
Doug, what drew you to this field?
Yeah. Thanks, Mita.
I got involved with this 34 years ago
when I met my stepdaughter, Krista,
who has down syndrome.
She was three at the time.
I was aware that there was discrimination
but I wasn't aware at how pervasive
it was.
Things such as, people
protesting her going into her school
as the first person with a developmental
disability in the school.
And so that sort of shifted my paradigm on life and gave me a focus.
And over the
past 34 years, I've worked as a volunteer,
as a frontline worker,
and now a board member.
And now in my current position
for the last 13 years is the CEO of UNITI,
and UNITI is the partnership of three
not for profit organizations,
one of which,
supports people with developmental
disabilities and acquired brain injuries.
And we found about 20 years ago,
that there just wasn't
the same housing options for people
with developmental disabilities.
And so that became part of our mission
was to create, and, maintain
and run housing that would be inclusive
to the entire community.
That's the short version.
Right. Right.
And I know it's
more complicated than that, but it's
beautiful to hear that your passion
was ignited by family for this work.
Thank you for sharing that story.
Jewels, what about you?
I'd love to hear your story.
Why is accessible
housing such a meaningful cause for you?
When I joined a housing co-op
in Coquitlam, I have served on the board
three different times.
I'm currently
the outgoing President.
As we dissolve and go into a new co-op
under the name Packard Housing Co-op.
When I came in here, I was using a scooter
because I had a disability
at the time.
They weren't really sure
what was going on,
but I needed a scooter
and then a wheelchair.
And for a long period of time,
I was unable to do
outside activities
without the assistance of a wheelchair.
Then my health improved somewhat.
But it was important for me
to have an accessible unit.
So I was switch from what was a regular
unit to an accessible unit.
And you were talking about
how is that impacted my life?
And I have to say, one of the things
that is funny is people assume
that because I'm in an accessible unit,
I must use a wheelchair.
So I get some kind of nasty comments
occasionally, like,
why do you have an accessible unit?
You look fine.
There's nothing wrong with you.
And they're not nice about it.
I'm not talking about people
that are polite and are interested.
I'm talking about people
who think that they know
what they're talking about and they don't.
And so they can be quite rude
and a little bit uppity,
and then you just have to use it
as a teachable moment and go, oh,
wait a second.
Not all abilities are different
abilities, as I call them, are visible
and so just because they look fine to
you doesn't mean
I don't benefit from having,
a bathtub
that's got accessible bars all around it.
I have a wider space to be able to change
and do things.
If I ever need to go back into
my wheelchair, I have that access, etc.
And so it's been a positive opportunity
for me personally
to learn about the challenges
that come both in and out of
using some sort of mobility aid
and also just personally
navigating the world
with different abilities.
So that's kind of my story.
Well,
first, I'm glad you've got that unit.
Thank you.
And it's very interesting
when we think about
invisibility
and who gets erased as a result.
Right.
We'll dive into that more.
Brad, tell us a story.
Tell us your story.
Oh, gosh. My story.
I've been quadriplegic for 44 years now.
And this whole accessibility thing
is a second career for me.
I spent 25 years in the television
business,
and in 1990,
I owned and operated the second largest
production company west of Toronto.
So we were a very busy group.
And I got a call from my old friend
Rick Hansen,
and he asked me if I'd be interested
in being the Project Manager
for the largest congress
and exposition on disability ever held,
at least to that point.
It was called independence 92.
And as a producer, I thought,
this is great, I'll go do this.
And I went there and I was,
up till then, I
wasn't part of the community of people
with disabilities, I was injured,
I got rehab,
I went back to work...
I was a busy guy and life was good,
but I had no exposure to people
with disabilities whatsoever
until this conference.
And this conference was 2700
delegates from 93 countries
around the world
with every conceivable disability
you can think of.
And in that conference, I met Justin Dart,
who was one of the founders of the ADA.
I met Henry Enns from Disabled Peoples’
International.
I met Laurie Beachell,
part of the independence movement,
and I was blown away by the fact
that there was so much to be done
and so few people doing it.
And actually Henry and
Laurie Beachell looked at me and said,
you should be here.
We need people
who know how to communicate.
And so at the end of that conference,
I wrapped up my television
production company and sold it
to the highest bidder and then opened up
Canadian Barrier Free
Design, the first professional access
consulting firm on the West Coast.
And from there I went on to...
I specialize in large public events
like the Olympics and the Paralympic Games
and those kinds of things and airports
and stuff like that.
But my whole exposure to that community,
suddenly I
just recognized
how we were being held back
and we were being held back
mostly by the built environment.
And that had to change.
So I was the guy to do it.
So just airports and just the Olympics.
Oh gosh. No.
Those are
not small things, Brad.
Well,
I had the great pleasure of being on the
International Paralympic Committee access
working group.
So that was determining the access
to be provided at all
venues and all events for the Paralympic
and Olympic Games.
So that led me into everything
from corner stores to bakeries to...
The interesting thing I found is
when it was the 2008 Games in Beijing,
and then the 2010 games here in Vancouver,
we were able to put 200 people, using
wheelchairs on the side of a mountain
to watch a downhill ski race.
Nobody had ever done that before.
But whether it was the big, big projects
or the little corner bakery,
the one thing they all had in common
is they knew what accessibility
meant to them, to their organization.
And that's one of the things
that's really important.
Access is not black and white.
It's gray.
And how it affects your organization
is critically important.
And it's the same in housing.
That's the same in commercial retail space.
Knowing how it affects your operation
is the only way you're going to know
what the return on investment is,
whether that's cash profit
or employee benefits or whatever it is,
the only
way to take that is to take it personally.
And that's what I've been trying
to get people to do now for
almost 30 years in the access business.
So, Brad, I think that's the perfect segue
to talk about the impact
of the Rick Hansen Foundation.
Tell me about what
the organization has done so far
to meet evolving,
accessible needs over the years.
How do you ensure your programs
remain relevant and impactful?
Well, the foundation has been around
for 35 years.
Maybe more than that now.
So we've taken a national
and international approach.
We're a unique position
to bring organizations open
for people with disabilities
to go to the corporate world.
And that's
something that Rick Hansen can do that
perhaps nobody else can do as well.
And so that's been a real key
to what we've been moving forward
to try to bring that knowledge forward
and to integrate
the needs of people with disabilities
into the every day
thinking of of bureaucrats, of government,
of corporate people.
But what we realized,
I was brought into the foundation
ten years ago
to develop the Rick Hansen Foundation
Accessibility Certification Program,
and what we recognized was
the built environment was the key
to the success
of all the other pillars of accessibility,
whether it's employment, transportation,
communications, web access,
they all rely on the built environment.
Even if you're working from home,
you're in a built environment.
So, the bottom line was,
without accessible
destination, accessible
transportation was not as important.
And even the best HR program in the world
wouldn't work
if I couldn't get in the building.
So the built environment became our focus.
Along with the school program.
Our school program
is really important to us, but the Built
Environment program,
what we had to really do is
get industry
to recognize the return on investment.
It's just laying there and they're
just ignoring, and help them understand
this isn't about more regulation
is not about more red tape.
It's about you. It’s about your family.
It's about your mom.
So the the built environment
became a focus.
We recognize that the industry
has evolving needs as well.
The demographics are changing.
The industry needs are changing.
All this stuff has to come together.
And it's all about the practical
application of universal design
and delivering that is in our DNA.
Can I ask you to define universal design?
Universal design is not a thing.
It's not a prescription.
It doesn't tell you
how wide a door should be.
It doesn't tell you anything
about what you should do for acoustics.
There are a set of principles
developed by Dr Greg Rice
back in the early 1980s.
And the idea is quite simple.
If you've made an environment work
and functional and safe for young people,
and work for older adults
and seniors, everything else in the
middle would work itself out.
So these are principles.
Universal design is an approach.
It's a way
of looking at a built environment.
And once you start seeing barriers to
people with disabilities, you can't stop.
And that's our great advantage. Yeah.
When people go through our course,
you can just see the lights go on.
Now, when an architect discovers
that a handrail
is not just for support,
but it's actually navigation,
it tells people with vision loss
where the landings are.
Tell them
where the path of travel
is. By wrapping that handrail around, it
says, come with me.
I'm going to keep you safe
and that's why it's so important
that they meet that code
and that they follow that.
But when they take the course,
they see the penny drop.
It's not like, okay, I checked a box.
I did number
one of the seven principles I've got.
It's a way of looking at things,
it's a way of shifting the culture
to see what we really need
in the built environment
is just a broader user base.
Right now, everything's
designed for 18 to 55 year old males.
How did that happen?
Not the majority of the population.
So universal design is an approach.
It's a set of principles.
But by itself
it's not going to change the world.
Education
and culture shift is going to take that.
That lens is critical in how we think about housing
and how we think about buildings
and how we think of development.
Doug, what's the perspective of UNITI
when it comes to addressing
unique
housing needs, developmental disabilities?
You know,
what have been the pressing needs?
Yeah.
And I just wanted to say
to start that
our main building in South Surrey,
Administration and Services building,
worked for and received the gold standard
from the Rick Hansen Foundation.
And it was a really useful thing to go
go through in terms of learning
sort of that universal design.
And as an organization that supports
people with developmental disabilities
and acquired brain injuries, many of whom
also have physical disabilities...
It was a really useful
process for us to go to.
I’d sort of add, from our perspective,
what we have found
is that there's a paradigm of disability,
particularly around people
with developmental disabilities, where
there's a role
that they exist to receive help.
And it's a very charitable model.
And as Brad said, we find
when we talk with people
and listen to people, that in fact,
they want to have everything
that everybody else has.
And so we look at our role
as supporting people with
developmental disabilities
to have the same access to housing,
to have the same variety of housing as
everybody else in the community has.
One way to sort of
make this clear is that when
people in the general community
think about people with developmental
disabilities in housing, quite often
it is about
people with developmental disabilities
still living in institutions.
It's about the idea that, oh, well,
you have a developmental disability,
then automatically you want a roommate.
The idea that
a person with a developmental disability,
the first home that they move into after
their family home is their forever home.
And that's not the experience
of most people.
Most people go through a variety
of different housing as they progress.
And so we look at it,
UNITI is listening to people.
What is it you want for housing?
And that's why we actually started
developing housing.
We're not developers.
We became a developer because there wasn't
the type of housing that was needed.
And ironically enough, that
type of housing was just like housing.
That was welcoming to people
with developmental disabilities.
So we sometimes
try to make things strange and weird,
but in fact, at the end of the day,
our job is to support people with
developmental disabilities
to have the same opportunities
for housing as everybody else.
Right.
You're
filling a gap. You're filling a need
that people just didn't take
into consideration because they weren't
listening.
Jewels, you're someone that also
directly engages with the community.
What are you hearing from
individuals and families?
I just think about our place here.
We were built in 1981.
We have 170 units, but there's only four
accessible units,
what they term accessible units.
My corridor from the front door
to go around the corner
into where the bedroom door
is, is such a sharp corner
that you can't help
but take off the drywall on the corners,
because there's no bumpers on the corners.
It wasn't built with the proper
concept of what a person with different
abilities needs in order to live
and enjoy their home the same way
anybody else does in the other units.
But also the community
is looking at things like,
since we've got the BC Accessibility Act
that's come in, we have changes.
And I had a member come to me recently
with something.
I was so grateful she mentioned it to me.
She is visually challenged.
And so at night when she wants to come
in our back entrance
through the loading zone area,
when she gets dropped off for a ride,
she can't use it because even though
there's lighting, it's not adequate
for her to be able to safely navigate
the sidewalk to get into the back door.
So she goes to the side entrance
and comes in that one instead.
And that doesn't have an automatic door.
It's further away from where she is,
and I don't think it feels quite
as secure for her either.
But it is.
There is a security camera, so I think
although there have been shifts
and I'm very grateful for the work
that's being done, the Accessibility
Act coming into play and all these things.
I still think there's a great deal
more work that needs to be done for sure.
Yeah, it definitely sounds like that.
And we're talking about individuals
at this point, but people in families,
people with extended families.
Right. There's different needs
there as well.
Building on that, how do we ensure that
housing design addresses both physical
and developmental disabilities?
Doug, we know this past summer,
construction began on Harmony Apartments,
which is a development designed
to offer affordable
and inclusive
housing for a diverse group of residents.
Can you share what design
considerations went in mind?
I can compare the two.
So we built Chorus in 2016.
The first
purpose built rental building in Surrey
in about three decades.
And at that time we were like, okay, how
many adoptable units do we have to build?
And it was four.
So we said, well, we'll do double,
we'll build eight because
that's what we believe in.
And it was a very sad experience
with Chorus
because of the 71 homes,
20 were for people
with developmental disabilities.
And it turned out that none of them really
had any serious physical disabilities.
And so, they didn't need the adaptable
units, which was great.
So we were like, okay,
well, we've got eight adaptable units.
That's awesome.
We can now have people
with physical disabilities move in.
But when we looked out there and we tried,
the problem was
there was a disconnect
between the adaptable unit
and the rent that we needed
to get for those units.
And because we were using
our funding,
that was a building built largely
with our funding, to support the tenants
with developmental disabilities,
we couldn't address that gap and rent
for people with physical disabilities.
And it was very unfortunate.
In fact, at the end of the day,
it was just one gentleman
who actually came from Kelowna
who needed the adaptable unit and used it.
And the other seven, we had to just
rent out to the general population.
So that saddened me at that time.
What I like about the
Harmony Project is it's
part of the Community
Housing Fund with BC
Housing and was supported by BC Housing,
and that comes with requirements
to have six adaptable units,
but even better, six accessible units.
So we're going to have 12 in total
and six of them accessible.
I love that. We are still going to have
the same percentage of homes for people
with developmental disabilities, but
because also the way the rents are set up,
where 20% are going to be at shelter rate,
so those are likely to be people
with developmental disabilities,
but then 50% of the rents are at rent
geared to income.
And that means that we will be able
to use the adaptable
and accessible units
for people who actually need that.
And I'm very happy for that.
So it's a better setup.
That’s a very novel concept actually.
To be able to move
around where you
need to be with those subsidies in place, yeah.
Yeah.
And it makes us accountable
as a landlord as well
that people aren't choosing us
just because we have a subsidy,
but they're choosing us
because we're good landlords, which we are.
Right, right. Exactly.
Brad and Jewels, like what other factors?
We're talking about income.
What other factors do you think
are important to creating housing
that fosters independence and belonging
and a sense of community.
Having access to resources
and having someone
within the community that you're
part of or that you're representing
that has the knowledge base of knowing
where to go and who to connect with.
And for me personally, being involved
in the community and different committees
and stuff that I'm involved
in, it's been really beneficial
because it's helped me to connect
with a lot of different types of people
that are doing community work
in the Tri-Cities area,
and so I've been able to, for my members
and for people in the community,
be able to say, hey, I've met this person.
They're able to help you with this.
Right now, we have an individual
who needed assistance with income
in order to continue to live in the co-op
because he was disabled,
but he had been supported by his family
and they both passed away.
And now he's all of a sudden
living on his own.
He's run out of his trust money and boom,
how am I supposed to survive?
And he did not have the skill
set to be independent
without assistance.
So fortunately, through SHARE, we were
able to give him assistance with getting
PWD started,
getting
his income support there for himself,
start to work on
other things that he needs to do
and get him downsizing to a smaller unit,
which will be more manageable
and more in line with his income.
So having the ability to know
who to connect with is really important.
So I think one area
that we need to grow in is...
You wouldn't want to do...
It’s not a fair type thing,
but something
where there is the ability to
bring together
like minded people that genuinely care
about freedom of access
and quality of life for all members
of the community that you're part of,
and just bringing people together
and brainstorming and also just learning
to connect with one another
so you know who to reach out to.
Like I have people
that have reached out to me
because they knew that I was at a co-op
and might be able to assist
someone that needed housing desperately,
or I learned about through Community
Land Trust that they have a fund for women
fleeing domestic violence
that are looking for assistance,
paying for their shares to get into
a housing co-op or a disabled person.
There are so many resources
that of all of us represent
different organizations, that we know about
because of the work that we do,
but I don't think there's a good
cohesive way yet
of connecting those dots to make it
more readily available when needed.
Okay, that's definitely food for thought.
And that plays into the future, right, of...
and shaping the future
of accessible living.
Brad, what are the trends?
What are we
going to be looking for?
Well, just on that topic,
let's remember there's two issues here.
One is economic
and the other is the built environment.
They are not the same.
Not interchangeable.
The accessible dwelling project
that's been booted down the road to 2027.
But if we can start, if every home is
built to anticipate the needs of the user.
In other words, be adaptable.
It's not just little portions
of a development, not 5%, not 10%.
All of a sudden Jewels and Doug,
they've got much more choice.
They can work...
So the economic issues can be
put into almost any development then,
because almost any development would work
if they follow the rules.
So that's what's really important
is to separate those two issues.
Too often I see like a development design
for seniors,
but the only design that went into
it is the economic model.
They didn't talk about hallways
with 90 degree corners.
You know, one of the things we recommend
is just take the corners off.
It's those oblique things, right.
We took the corners off
to make it easier for people using
mobility devices
and not hitting walls and stuff.
It turned out it was a big benefit
for people using sign language
as they're walking along,
talking to each other
and the 90 degree corner comes up,
inclusion hazards.
But if when that corner was cut off,
they could see an advanced
and in a couple of instances,
we put a convex mirror on the wall so
you can see what's coming down the hall.
So making the built environment work
for everyone...
Now that's the start.
Now the economic model comes into play.
And organizations
like UNITI can take over and start
making creative, real,
meaningful access for users.
You can't tell me how to make my home
accessible because you don't know me.
Yeah, I can't use a grab bar. These...
I'm a quad. These don't grab anything.
So there's no grab bars in my house.
If you look closely, you’ll notice
one of the bookcases beside the toilet
sticks out about three inches
further than it should.
And that's because I lean on it.
That's my grab bar.
You can't know that.
So from building homes
for people with disabilities,
the idea that you can create accessible
suite for me is ludicrous.
You don't know me.
So it's better to create a suite
that anticipates the needs of me,
or when I move out the next user
and have the infrastructure ready for
the needs of UNITI,
the needs of the co-op users.
I think that's actually a very interesting
point, Brad, is that once again,
you're pointing out having a space that
is adaptable is key to begin with.
My mother has recently
fallen ill,
and I'm navigating that for her.
She lives with me.
So that's another
consideration, is families that bring in
or support
individuals...
Intergenerational living.
You know, we don't
take advantage.
The other cultures do it all the time
and we just don't.
And it's so vexing to me.
And that combined
with the concept of
we call able bodied people TABs
because you're only temporarily
able bodied.
It doesn't matter whether you do a face plant
when you're a teenager,
you end up in a wheelchair or you're 65.
You need a walker and a hearing aid.
You will be part of our community.
We're the largest
minority group in the world,
and the only one that anyone can join
at any moment, whether it's a fall down
the stairs, an illness, car accident,
or as they say, if you just get old.
The bottom line
is, it's not about somebody else.
It's about you and your family.
It's about your mom.
Exactly. And
I mean, these conversations
seem very niche to people sometimes,
but they are really just so broad
and so impactful in community.
What would you say to people
who would question
the specificity of this conversation?
What would either of you, anyone,
say to them
about how important this is
for a broader, larger community?
I think when you look at statistics
regarding health, mental health
of people that live in communities
that have people of different age
groups, you will actually find that
they are healthier.
Seniors love to have the ability
to see kids around them,
especially those that don't have grandkids
that are living close by.
My daughter lives in a unit down
the hall from me, my chosen daughter.
She's a wonderful gal
and she helps me out quite a bit.
So she comes and helps me with some of
the things that I find difficult to do.
And we actually split groceries.
We split the cost of other things
because the cost of living is so high
and I'm on a pension, she's
working full time,
but we share the cost of food and stuff.
There's other ways, and as a co-op,
we've had people mention
maybe we could have a Costco card
and go and bulk buy certain things
so that we have the ability to help people
that are struggling within
our community. So to me,
the concept of supportive
environment,
not just the accessible environment,
but a supportive environment,
an environment where you build community.
Whatever development you're part of.
Because truthfully, years ago
when I lived in an apartment building,
I could say hi to my neighbours
and I knew who they were.
But truthfully, you said hi.
Have a good day.
That was about it.
You didn't really know them.
Whereas I've lived in a housing co-op
for 27.5 years,
and I know nearly everybody here,
and not just because of my role
working on the board,
but just in general, getting to know them
because it's a more social environment,
it's a more welcoming environment usually.
co-op living.
And so there is a proviso that you must be
willing to volunteer in some way.
They want you to participate.
Our mission has to be to keep people
in their communities
as long as humanly possible,
to stay in their homes
as long as humanly possible.
Even when they have to go into long
term care, it should be small facilities
within their community
so they can stay there.
And it takes all advantage of
the whole community piece,
the intergenerational living piece.
You know, when
grandma can't go see her grandson
play hockey at the local arena
because the sidewalks are cracked
or the door is too heavy, or
the stairs are too steep, or whatever
it might be to keep her away
when she can't go there a little thread
breaks,
right?
It distances her from her family,
it distances her from the community and
the whole system starts to break down.
And we need to respect our elders
more than we are.
Why can't the bottom two floors
of any new condominium
be set up as Long-Term Care Suites?
You know, one of the suites
would be dedicated to a resident
in care person.
And the bottom two...
So as you age,
you actually move down in your building.
You know, for the building owner,
he retains the asset
and undoubtablly some support
from the health care system
and return on investment for the owner,
its return on investment for the community
is return on investment for the person who's
just trying to stay part of their family
without feeling
that they're a burden to it.
Yeah, and Jewels and Brad,
I think you really nailed it
with your comments about community
and including
multigenerational community.
And, you know, historically, people
with developmental disabilities...
You talked about a thread, Brad.
There was a cord
that was cut because children were
put into institutions and separated.
And now, the joy of a tenant
with developmental disability
being able to go to the store, phone their
mom and say, hey, mom, I'm at the store.
Is there anything I can pick you up?
Such a simple, simple thing, simple
act of kindness that all of us has done,
a person with a developmental disability
never having the opportunity to do that.
And now they do. And of course they do.
And that reciprocal relationship
between the...
we have no policy in our apartments about
you have to do things together,
nothing like that.
But by the very fact that there are people
with developmental disabilities
who are part of that housing
first of all, it kind of sets,
people choose to move into that place,
know that.
So it kind of... that's a bit
of a vetting right at the very beginning.
But then the people that are living
there, it's just fantastic. Families,
seniors, people with disabilities.
We've had four babies born
in the last year, and it's just fantastic
to have a community
that cares about each other
and also is completely great
for the business community because people
who live in affordable housing, they shop
locally, they don't go to Palm Springs
for half of the year.
And if you're shopping locally,
so the dollar store or the Safeway, etc.,
they love the fact that that building
is being built next to them
because they've got 100 people
that are shopping at their store.
So it's great for the community, it’s great
for the business community.
I would add that we do quality of life
surveys every 3 or 4 years,
scientifically verified.
And recently,
they now have an indicator
of like the average British Columbian.
And so people without disabilities
and the tenants with disabilities
who live in Chorus
apartments have a higher quality of life
than the average British Columbian,
something that it's very unheard of,
when it comes to people
with developmental disabilities.
However, I would also make the argument
that if we were to survey
the entire building, everyone who lives in
that building has a
higher quality of life
than the average British Columbian,
because their greatest worry of British
Columbians has been taken off the table,
which is to have safe, affordable housing.
They don't have to worry about that.
Well, this TAB thanks you.
All three of you.
I'm going to use that now.
That's a great term.
You’re such a wise panel of experts
with lived experience, and
I'm just so grateful for this conversation
and your perspectives.
We've barely scratched the surface.
And yeah, there's so much to unpack.
But again, thank you so much.
It's been so great listening to you
and hearing your different perspectives.
I really appreciate it.
To learn more about BC Housing,
including how to apply for subsidized
housing in British Columbia, visit
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