Photo: City of Penticton

The construction of a four-storey, forty-unit apartment building to be used for affordable housing was approved by city council on Monday night.

Penticton city councillors voted unanimously Tuesday evening to approve a forty-unit apartment building in the downtown core to be used for affordable housing.

The four-storey development will be built at 259 Backstreet Boulevard, on a lot currently being used for about 50 private parking spots. 

The building will see two commercial retail spaces on the ground-level floor and a total of 40 residential spaces for rent on the second, third and fourth floors.

Seventy per cent of the residential spaces will be two-bedroom units, planned for family and children, and 30 per cent will be one-bedroom units, planned for couples or single individuals. Three of those 40 units will be fully accessible for persons with disabilities. 

Once construction is finished, B.C. Housing will purchase the property from the developer, EllisDon, and work with social non-profit groups to administer the rental spaces and retail spaces. 

In approving the structure, city council approved an exemption to their parking bylaws, as only 27 parking stalls have been proposed by EllisDon. In regular circumstances, the minimum number of parking stalls would need to be equivalent to the number of residential units on the property. 

In exchange, EllisDon will sign on to the downtown car share program, which counts for six stalls on the property, and provide a cash-in-lieu payment to the city for the remaining seven stalls, at $5,000 dollars per stall.

"Yes, we're losing some parking downtown, but I think a project like this... it's another step towards creating a walkable downtown community," Councillor Max Picton said. "When you increase the density of the downtown... you're really promoting that you don't need to have vehicles.

"I really hope that we're starting to near density levels in our downtown core that we can hopefully attract that grocery store that we've all dreamt about having in our downtown... And hopefully complete that walkable-downtown core community," Picton added.