Human Resources committee  If I may, Saint John thinks very highly of FCM. In fact, they have funded several consultant-type projects for us, albeit not necessarily to do with affordable housing. I don't personally see a need for another intermediary, and I'm not sure they would have the staffing horsepower to act as that intermediary, in any event, for a project as large as the housing accelerator program that we're speaking about here today.

Human Resources committee  If I may, I'd like to piggyback on Mayor Taylor's comment. I think it should be primarily focused on service providers. A lot of the smaller communities are provided the service of housing from larger regional entities, etc. In New Brunswick, we don't have a regional government structure, so it's the cities themselves.

Human Resources committee  The City of Saint John can provide the committee with our entire housing needs assessment, which was recently completed. It lays out a number of the figures you're seeking. The short answer is, there are well over 2,000 on the waiting list, and I referred to the fact that we have many who are just on the line, on top of that.

Human Resources committee  First of all, in terms of distributing the money, I respectfully suggest that maybe stealing a page out of the gas tax fund approach would be useful, where the money is provided directly to the municipalities. We've spoken about that. What could it achieve for us? At the end of the day, we have to get the cost per door down.

Human Resources committee  If I may again, this is John Collin, city manager in Saint John. When it comes to rent controls, I agree it is a fine balance. One thing to consider for smaller communities such as ours is the reality that we do not have a plethora of developers. Therefore, anything we do that affects their bottom line would cause them to reflect as to whether or not the development is worth proceeding with or whether they ought to go elsewhere for that development.

Human Resources committee  If I may, Mr. Chair and members of the committee, the short answer to that question is through a variety of different ways. I do not believe there is one Holy Grail that will solve the affordable housing crisis in Saint John. We need to take a look at it all, from subsidies to land acquisition, to special training programs for developers and architects to find ways to drive costs down, to increasing horsepower in staffing to get the programs moving forward to keep our very enviable permit turnaround times and zoning change times to reasonable levels to achieve the supply.

Human Resources committee  Good afternoon, members of the committee. I am indeed honoured to be here speaking on behalf of our community, and I will, of course, limit my comments to the Saint John perspective. When it comes to affordable housing, the city of Saint John is in crisis. We estimate that in 2021, home ownership was not achievable by 60% of the households in Saint John, and approximately 40% of our very large rental household community did not have access to affordable housing.