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Saskatoon city council formed a makeshift plan to begin addressing housing quality in the Pleasant Hill neighbourhood during a standing committee meeting Monday.
Responding to a letter addressed to Mayor Charlie Clark and councillor Hillary Gough from the Pleasant Hill Community Association, the committee earmarked boarded up houses across the neighbourhood as its primary concern.
“Everyone deserves a proper place to live,” Jennifer Altenberg, president of the Pleasant Hill Community Association, said when speaking before the committee. “It’s just overwhelming what we see around the housing… I really feel the autonomy for our community members would be in proper wraparound housing in the housing grants.”
Altenburg said there are currently 56 boarded up homes in Pleasant Hill.
Housing issues in Pleasant Hill did not surprise Gough, who has been following up with the fire department about boarded up homes.
“A preliminary look at this has identified that very few of those 56 properties were actually boarded up by the Saskatoon Fire Department,” Gough said, revealing her own findings.
“It seems to me that there is absolutely some work to be done to figure out how those homes are ending up in that condition, whether other agencies were involved, or if it’s at the direction of the landlords.”
Councillor Troy Davies and Gough voiced their support for added measures for landlord accountability and a nuisance abatement bylaw. Council previously supported a landlord licensing bylaw. A report is expected to arrive to council before the end of the year.
Gough responded to the contents of the letter by asking city administration to explore opportunities of surveying certain areas of the city that have identified heightened levels of need.
The committee also recommended forwarding last week’s letter to the board of police commissioners.
“Talking to councillor Gough and members of the community, they are monitoring and tracking (boarded up houses) more than anyone,” Clark said. “There just seems to be a gap in the system.”
Fire Chief Morgan Hackl confirmed the fire department has information on 42 boarded up houses, leaving 14 houses up to other jurisdictions like the Saskatchewan Health Authority.
Clark welcomed the conversation of improving Pleasant Hill, but prefers to see an expedited timeline to address them.
“We just haven’t been keeping track of these,” Clark said. “I would hope it would be a priority with the health authority (and) with the police to look at our process improvement. I see it as an opportunity that has been identified, but I don’t want it to take two years or three years for us to address this.”
Addressing the gaps in record keeping, finding out how the homes end up in a state of disrepair, and which agency is involved in the closures are all part of the recommendations put forward on Monday.
“Every neighbourhood deserves to be safe, and I want to work towards that,” Clark said.
Gough looks forward to engaging with a variety of community and provincial agencies to tackle the problem in a timely matter.
“It’s clear that there is a gap in responsibility on this issue, and its fallen on community members to collate the problem. The city is likely key to addressing that, but we’re going to do a better job of it by engaging all agencies,” she said.
The standing committee welcomed a report before the end of the year, but did not place a timeline on any recommendations put forth.