Provincial housing authority concerned by number of vandalized, vacant properties

The Saskatchewan Housing Authority says it’s concerning to see how many of its vacant properties are being vandalized.

According to the authority, it’s seeing one to two break-ins per week at its 18,000 vacant affordable housing units across the province.

Some of the vacant units are being renovated to get back up to living standards and to get families moved in, but some have seen a tremendous amount of damage.

Louise Michaud, the president of the Saskatchewan Housing Corporation, talked about the number of vacant units as well as the amount of crime happening inside them.

“We’re absolutely concerned with our vacancy rate,” Michaud said. “We’re (also) concerned about (the crime rate). What we’re doing right now in order to try and mange that is hire security to manage inspections.”

Damage done during a suspected break-in at a Saskatchewan Housing Authority home. (Shane Clausing/980 CJME)

While security is checking in on all the empty units in the province, the break-ins and vandalism are still happening.

Members of the Regina media were given a tour Monday of some of the homes that have been impacted by crime.

One home the media toured had holes punched in walls, copper wiring ripped out and cabinets dangling. The authority says it’ll cost $20,000 to fix up the home.

Each year, the province budgets $2.3 million to cover items like vandalism for provincially owned homes.

Michaud says the authority wants to add alarms in some of the empty homes, but notes that is not a quick fix.

“It is something that we’re considering and looking at, (but) we have to consider the cost of doing that versus the cost of repairs, But it is something we’re considering,” she explained.

That said, Michaud admitted it’s not guaranteed that installing systems would reduce crime on the homes.

The authority has boarded up some homes it’s working on to hopefully deter crime from damaging renovations being completed on the inside.

While the authority can talk about beefing up security all it wants, Michaud noted the best way to reduce crime in vacant units are getting people moved into them.