A new report suggests the District of Lantzville should be prepared to accommodate 286 additional homes by 2030.
Lantzville's interim housing needs report, presented by Jamie Vann Struth with Deloitte, provides an updated summary of interim housing needed in the district. It was funded by the Regional District of Nanaimo and is mandated by the province.
The intent is for the numbers to be used to update Lantzville's official community plan by the end of 2025 in preparing for population growth. As of the 2021 census, there were 3,817 residents.
"Largely, we looked at the current demographics of Lantzville, and based off the households living in Lantzville, the types of homes they prefer in terms of the number of bedrooms, single-family versus multi-family and just sort of applied those characteristics to the growth going forward," Vann Struth explained. "Certain categories like homelessness and rental adjustment, obviously we put all those units into the rental category."
The result was that in five years' time, Lantzville should be prepared to handle an additional 229 single-family dwellings and 56 multi-family dwellings. By 2045, the report suggests the district should be prepared to accommodate 840 units.
"You can see over the 20 year[s], that almost three-quarters are larger units, three bedroom or four-plus bedroom units," Vann Struth said. "Over 600 out of 840 are larger units, and again, that's largely based on the history and characteristics of households living in Lantzville."
He told council that there's no requirement from the province to achieve the number of units in the time frame, but the district is provincially required to plan for it.
"As long as your OCP has enough residential land designated to fit that number of residential units, that's all you have to do."
Mayor Mark Swain called this clarification a relief.
"There are a lot of different factors obviously that play in to whether or not something will be realized," the mayor said. "After something has gone through a re-zoning, there are so many factors."
Swain wondered if Lantzville would have the ability to keep up with the infrastructure needed to support growth, a point also brought up by Coun. Joan Jones.
"I'm guessing the province is going to be maybe having a harder look," Swain said, "because I know there have been a lot of complaints from municipalities about all this increased focus on providing more housing and the trickle down cost to the people that already live here."
Jones specifically pointed to medical facilities, daycare, and social services.
"Hopefully we will find that some of the other issues that go along with it will be addressed [by the province], I'm certainly looking forward to that," Jones said.
In 2028 the numbers are planned to be realigned with the results of the 2026 census.
