Nova Scotia capital plan: New public housing units to nearly double across province

HALIFAX — The number of new public housing units planned in Nova Scotia is set to double under the province’s capital plan for the 2025-26 fiscal year, as thousands of people crowd the province’s affordable housing wait-list.

Growth and Development Minister Colton LeBlanc said the $2.4-billion plan announced Thursday includes 242 new public housing units at a total cost of $136.4 million over several years. That’s in addition to the 222 housing units and 51 modular homes that were announced over the past 18 months — the first investments in public housing in the province in 30 years.

The plan for the upcoming fiscal year provides $79 million for public housing — a figure that includes $47.4 million to get construction of the new units started and $31.6 million to modernize and repair existing public housing.

“Building more public housing is a key part of addressing the housing needs in our communities,” LeBlanc said, adding that the new units would house about 600 people.

While the Progressive Conservative government has long maintained that the private sector would respond to market demand, the minister stopped short of blaming it for failing to provide enough affordable housing options. LeBlanc said the province needs “every unit possible” and that adding to the public housing stock is part of the solutions to address shortages.

“Certainly there are still Nova Scotians facing very difficult situations and housing insecurity, but we want to reassure them that we are committed to addressing these challenges and finding them a safe place to stay,” he said.

But Finance Minister John Lohr was more blunt when asked why the government is adding to its new stock of public units. “You simply need to look at the wait-list for public housing to know why we are building more public housing,” said Lohr, who added there are currently well over 7,000 people on the list.

There’s no word on when the newly announced housing will be completed or where it will go; however, officials said the units would be built in areas where the demand for affordable housing is high, such as Halifax.

Officials also updated the status of the initial set of new homes that were announced in September 2023, saying that 22 units in Glace Bay and 20 units in Lower Sackville are expected to be completed this summer, and 11 in Kentville should be ready in the fall. The target completion date for 22 units in Bridgewater and 11 units in Grand Etang is the summer of 2026, while another 100 units in Lower Sackville, 30 in Halifax and seven in Bible Hill are expected to be ready by the summer of 2028.

NDP Leader Claudia Chender said the government’s announcement was “timely and needed,” but she added that even more needs to be done to meet the demand for affordable homes because not everyone is eligible for public housing.

“We need to be incentivizing supply with non-market housing that is actually affordable to people,” Chender said.

In other areas, the capital plan includes $1.4 billion for health, with $750.9 million earmarked for hospital projects in Halifax and the Cape Breton Regional Municipality. Money budgeted for building and renovating schools is $210 million, and more than $518 million will go toward highway construction and maintenance.

Lohr said the plan should provide some buffer against the spectre of tariffs by the United States. “This capital plan stimulates our economy and to some degree will insulate us in a small way from potential tariffs as well because this is generating economic activity within our province,” he said.

More details about the potential effects of U.S. tariffs would be included in the provincial budget set to be introduced Tuesday, he said.

This report by The Canadian Press was first published Feb. 13, 2025.

Keith Doucette, The Canadian Press