After sitting in limbo for years, a Penticton non-profit seniors housing project is getting back on track.
However, officials from the Kiwanis Housing Society are keeping mum about the rezoning application currently before city council.
Council this week unanimously voiced initial support for a proposed rezoning of the Housing Society property at 150 Van Horne St. A public hearing will be held Dec. 21.
Gary Leobold, the city‘s manager of planning, said rezoning the 0.44 hectare property to RM-6 (multi-family residential) from RM-4 would allow for greater density on the site. Plans still call for a four-storey complex.
Coun. Garry Litke said the housing project has been a long time in coming and pointed to the real need for such a project, suggesting some seniors have been on the waiting list for more than five years..
“There have been times in the last four or five years that I thought this project was dead. There was even talk about dividing up the property,” Litke said.
“I have to tip my hat to the members of the Kiwanis organization who have had the tenacity to keep on plugging away at this project.”
A Kiwanis spokesman declined immediate comment on the rezoning application Wednesday, suggesting more news might be forthcoming in January.
The service club first applied in May 2005 to B.C. Housing and Canada Mortgage and Housing Corp. for financial assistance with the project. A partnership agreement was also proposed.
The lot has remained vacant for several years. Plans call for 58 rental units. The RM-6 zone allows for 160 units per hectare as compared to 111 units under RM-4.
“The proposed development is a modest increase in scale and density in the neighbourhood, with a mix of low and medium-density residential development,” Leobold stated in a report to council.
Plans calls for a 70 per cent decrease in the number of parking spaces for such a multi-family development. There would be 29 parking stalls, rather than the 96 stalls required under city bylaws.
Coun. Mike Pearce voiced concerns about the lack of parking, but Leobold noted the facility will not be an assisted living complex and no staff parking is required. While it would be inadequate for a regular apartment building, he said, any possible future change in use would require a new rezoning application.
