Nanaimo council has approved an outdoor amenity space and an office to complement a proposed supportive housing project on Nicol Street.
At a meeting Monday, Sept. 8, city council unanimously passed a motion to allow staff to issue a 60-year lease of 354 Haliburton St. to B.C. Housing to construct an outdoor amenity space for the staff and residents of a Nicol Street supportive housing project, which will be operated by Snuneymuxw First Nation. Two parking stalls will also be built off-site.
The Haliburton Street property had previously been licensed to Island Crisis Care Society and the South End Community Association as a community garden and food forest, with that agreement expiring in 2021.
A staff report stated that B.C. Housing has advised the city that it will provide funding and support to improve and restore the property, which will be made into a “a healing space where the tenants can gather for programs, connect with the land, and benefit from native and traditional medicinal plants and the curative properties of the natural setting.” The site would have gates which will be kept open between 6 a.m.-6 p.m. for community use.
B.C. Housing advised city staff that M’akola Development Services, on behalf of Snuneymuxw First Nation, have engaged the community association, which has expressed support for the stated land use.
Coun. Ben Geselbracht requested that should any unwanted fruit trees and berry bushes should be transplanted elsewhere in the community, and applicants indicated they were amenable to the suggestion.
“A 10-year-old tree is a valuable thing,” Geselbracht said, “so if that could be taken into consideration, I think reaching out to [the South End Community Association] they could help with that process and could probably find the labour to move it as well.”
Coun. Hilary Eastmure spoke in support of the development.
“I also remember when this came through design panel, it was a really wonderful landscape plan,” she said. “I think it’s the bar to which we compare all other landscape plans now and it [included] retaining of much of what existed in the food forest, so thanks for that work. I’m really confident that it is going to be a really beautiful space that respects what is there and really adds to it.”
B.C. Housing will be responsible for all costs for maintenance, repairs, operation and security.
Along with the amenity, M’akola Development Services, on behalf of B.C. Housing, requested a development variance permit from the city to allow an office and social service resource centre with a parking variance at 364 Haliburton St. Staff recommended the social service resource centre aspect be dropped and that the site be approved for office use.
“The property is more intended to be used for administrative purposes … to provide information, referrals, counselling and advocacy purposes but not the other more intensive services that would be provided under a social services resource centre,” said Jeremy Holm, Nanaimo’s director of planning and development.
The 364 Haliburton St. project would entail converting an existing single residential dwelling into an office. Council unanimously supported staff’s recommendation to grant the temporary use permit for office use, as well as a development variance permit to vary the required parking from four spaces to zero.
Sydney Robertson, South End Community Association chairperson, delegated to council, stating that while the association isn’t in favour of the 55 Victoria Rd. daytime drop-in site, it does support the proposed supportive housing project on 355 Nicol St.
“I want to be really clear in letting you know that that’s a project we completely support and we’re very excited about,” Robertson said. “We’ve said for a long time that SECA has challenges with [the concentration of supportive housing and social services] in our neighbourhood, but the project plan at 355 Nicol St., if I could pick one and put it at the top of the list, that’s the one. It belongs exactly where it’s going and we’re just so excited. It’s a beautiful vision for the space.”
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