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More affordable housing projects set for Habitat Kamloops region

Building spree set to begin

Executive director William Miller and his team at Habitat for Humanity Kamloops are about to put the hammer down.

What that means is they are about to pick the hammer up and build a lot of affordable homes for people who need them most.

Habitat for Humanity Canada has put out the call for its local chapters to build more homes, and Habitat for Humanity Kamloops is going to do exactly that. It has numerous projects in various phases throughout its large region, which covers Princeton to Golden to Prince George and everywhere in between.

All told, the organization has nearly 150 homes that are either ready to be built or are at some point in the planning stages. The following projects are all in the pipeline:

• Blind Bay — Four homes are scheduled to be built, as the only hurdle left is the financing. “We’ve started taking applications for four families for those houses, and all things being equal, if we can get started this year we should have the families in the houses by spring,” Miller says.

• Salmon Arm — Habitat is waiting for the permits to be approved on a 21-unit project, which likely means its start will be pushed back until the spring.

• Sorrento — Between 40 and 60 single-storey, side-by-side units are poised to be built as an addition to Sorrento Lions Manor. Miller and Co. have an agreement with Sorrento Housing Society, but the project may have to be done in phases. “We’re just going through the pre-feasibility right now, which means we’re in preliminary design and we’re looking at the site to see what we can fit on there,” Miller says.

• Sicamous — Habitat is looking at working with the District of Sicamous on a multi-family project, which will be feature somewhere in the neighbourhood of 50 to 60 units. Discussions are currently ongoing in an effort to find a location. The shovels will be in the ground in either late 2022 or early 2023 at the earliest.

• Merritt — Working in conjunction with Eagle Homes, a modular home manufacturing company, Habitat will be putting eight new homes in the Country Music Capital of Canada. “We hope to start manufacturing the first one in January and be on site in May,” Miller says.

Habitat for Humanity Kamloops is also in discussions with officials from Lytton to help rebuild the community after most of it was destroyed by a wildfire in June.

Miller figures all of these projects will keep him and his team busy for at least the next three years. All projects except for the Sorrento one, which already has a waiting list, will need to accept applications to determine who will get the homes. Each recipient is no longer required to help build the home, but they are encouraged to perform 500 hours of volunteer service.

Habitat for Humanity will always accept straight donations, but it is also conducting its annual Classic Car Raffle to raise funds for its home-building needs.

“The whole purpose behind the Classic Car Raffle is to help us do what we just talked about,” Miller says. “It’s to help fund the organization so we can deliver affordable housing.”

This article is written by or on behalf of the sponsoring client and does not necessarily reflect the views of Castanet.



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