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Response to Canadian Home Builders Association report

In 2008, the Canadian Home Builders Association commissioned Altus Clayton to write a report that is very critical of Inclusionary Housing.  This report has been used as the basis for arguments that municipalities should not use IH policies to try to increase the supply of affordable housing.

The Wellesley Institute commissioned David Rusk, a leading American expert on Inclusionary Housing, to examine this report and look at the counter-arguments in favour of using this tool.  Richard Drdla, the leading Canadian expert, has also written a paper that examines the many flaws in the Altus Clayton report.

Altus Clayton Report

David Rusk Critique

Richard Drdla Critique

Inclusionary Housing and its Impact on Housing and Land Markets

David Rosen, Inclusionary Housing and its Impact on Housing and Land Markets, 2004.  To determine if inclusionary housing programs are associated with a decline in housing production, the author compiled data on annual housing starts over a 20-year period in California.

Read the report

Conference Board of Canada Recommends Inclusionary Housing

The Conference Board of Canada, an independent, not-for-profit applied research organization whose members include some of the most prestigious members of the business community recently released a called Building From the Ground Up: Enhancing Affordable Housing in Canada.

This report identifies Inclusionary Zoning, one of the principle components of an Inclusionary Housing program as a “noteworthy innovation”.  The report says, in part:

“Government initiatives frequently involve the use of taxation and spending power to create more units. As the models reveal, however, governments can also leverage their planning and building permission powers—for example, density bonusing or inclusionary zoning initiatives—to encourage the private sector to incorporate affordable units into market development projects.”

The report can be downloaded from the Conference Board of Canada web site.