The City of Delta has approved a new tenant policy and rental stock protection policy.
The new policies will become part of the cities Housing Action Plan, which was approved last November.
According to the staff report, presented at the July 24 council meeting, where civic politicians unanimously approved the new policies, the two policies will work in tandem and will come into effect immediately.
The Tenant Relocation Policy is meant to help reduce impacts faced by existing tenants of rental buildings undergoing redevelopment.
The Rental Stock Protection Policy is designed to protect against the net loss of purpose-built rental units due to redevelopment. Both policies would apply at the time of rezoning for sites that have existing rental developments with five or more units.
According to the 2022 Rental Market Report from Canada Mortgage and Housing Corporation, Delta has 1,740 purpose-built rental units distributed throughout Ladner, Tsawwassen and North Delta.
“I want to thank staff for coming forward with this policy, which is a result of our housing action plan,” said Coun. Dylan Kruger. “Almost all of our rental stock in Delta was built in the 20th Century and a significant portion was built prior to 1980, so we are going to see, as that stock becomes older, more re-development applications come forward to council. We are lucky to date that we haven’t had to deal with a lot of tenant re-location issues, but they are coming. It’s so important that as we are trying to expand our housing stock, build more housing and more rentals, that we are supporting our existing renters.
“This policy puts us in line with the majority of other cities in Metro Vancouver who have already put tenant re-location and rental stock protection policies in place. It makes we feel really comfortable and positive moving forward that we can have good discussions about re-development knowing that the existing tenants will be protected.”
