By Heather Montgomery
The city recently ordered the demolition of five houses in Centretown, bypassing the traditional requirement for approval of replacement infrastructure, because councillors say the condemned buildings, with its unofficial residents in the neighbourhood pose a risk to the community.
The property, on Cambridge Street North near Somerset Street West, has seen three fires in the last few years, as well as squatters and drug activity.
Centretown has a number of abandoned properties, including those on Bay Street and on Gilmour Street.
Somerset Ward Coun. Diane Holmes says she thinks the problem is fairly minor, but occasionally there are properties that exist in a state of disuse, as the owner has no future plans for the site.
“It’s really a waste of land, because we are looking for infill and we want to see good development to strengthen the residential community,” says Holmes, noting that fire is the biggest risk on such properties, due to the likelihood of the flames spreading to nearby houses.
Often, people with nowhere else to go will find themselves squatting in one of these condemned houses.
“I respect their right to [squat],” says Jane Scharf, a local poverty activist. “If they have no support or low income housing they have to live somehow.”
Scharf says the life of a squatter is far from ideal because there is often no heat or hydro and squatters live in constant fear of being arrested.
“It would be much more reasonable to make housing affordable,” says Scharf.
Holmes agrees the problem is that squatters have so few options in Ottawa.
“I think that [squatters are] an indication that we don’t have nearly enough affordable housing,” says Holmes.
Andrew Nellis, spokesperson for the Panhandlers Union, says there are two types of squatters – philosophical squatters who think of it as a lifestyle, and squatters by necessity who have nowhere else to go. In Ottawa, he says, it is usually the latter.
“A single male, for example, often has no other choice but to sleep rough,” says Nellis. The waiting period for subsidized housing in Ottawa, Nellis says, is years long, especially for single adults.
“At the end of 2006, there were 10,000 households on the waiting list for housing,” says Mary-Martha Hale, chair of the Alliance to End Homelessness. “We need to have more affordable housing built.”
Hale says “affordable,” according to the definition of the Canadian Mortgage and Housing Corporation, means that an individual or a family pays less than 30 per cent of their income for housing.
Hale says many people in Ottawa are paying over 50 per cent of their income towards housing.
“Properties are abandoned for a variety of reasons,” says Hale. “If the city has authority to recuperate them, it would be useful.”
Holmes says properties like the one on Cambridge Street are privately owned and usually in quite bad condition.
“The city would not spend money on [the abandoned properties] for the one year that the developer wouldn’t be using them,” says Holmes.
After the demolition of the property on Cambridge Street, the city says it will be fenced off to prevent illegal parking and any other activity.