REGINA, Sask. — Regina Mayor Chad Bachynski is hopeful more federal funding will be used for land banks.
Bachynski spent Tuesday and Wednesday in Ottawa at a housing conference hosted by the Federation of Canadian Municipalities to advocate for a bigger voice on options for affordable housing.
“I don’t think the federal government is as aware of the land banks and the benefits they could bring to its goal of increasing the affordable housing supply. I think what we need is simply more of a voice, which is part of what I was doing in Ottawa.”
Bachynski said the conversations focused on how municipalities can strategically acquire unused land.
“We’re trying to look at any creative options available to leverage land, increase vibrancy and increase housing supply, especially in our communities. Land prices can be the biggest barrier to that, so if we can eliminate or drastically reduce that cost, we have a much higher chance of creating affordable housing in our community.”
Regina itself began purchasing land for an established land bank in 2024 through funding from the federal government's Housing Accelerator Fund.
Currently, the city has 46 lots and has seen interest from its first intake.
“There's actually been quite a bit of interest now from just approaching it differently than traditional development.”
Land bank properties with an appraised value of $100,000 or less can be leased or sold for $1.
The city has also established a new hierarchy for acquiring land.
A four-tier system begins with community land trusts, also known as non-profits owning land, at Tier 1, non-profits at Tier 2, for-profits at Tier 3 and neighbourhood side lots at Tier 4.
But the city hasn’t set a goal for the number of affordable units it is aiming to achieve per parcel.
“I don’t think we have quite that level of granularity in terms of square footage per parcel. I think it’s more about the use cases and, obviously, the priority of what kind of housing we’re looking at and what the need is. That’s going to be more of how we approach it.”
On using more funding for land banks, Bachynski said models like the Housing Accelerator Fund can give the city different avenues to explore.
“When we see a need like this, we can strategically put dollars towards different initiatives.”
Bachynski, fellow local mayors and representatives from the province will head to Ottawa in October.
“I'm gonna use that as an opportunity to try and get more visibility on some of the work that we're doing. The last go-around, I would say I focused mostly on our growth plan and the infrastructure piece that's still number one; in addition, here's another opportunity to invest to create affordable housing.”
