Ford came out swinging Tuesday at a proposal, approved unanimously by the affordable housing committee, to spend $15 million to construct 71 affordable rental apartments inside a yet-to-be-built East Bayfront condo building.
“You don’t use your waterfront — prime property — for affordable housing,” Ford said. “But when you get an opportunity to get the feds and the province on board, obviously you’ve got to take advantage of that.
“So I’m split, the location to me is ridiculous, again you don’t use prime property for affordable housing, but then again can we get the province and feds to give us money for affordable housing which we need, put it somewhere else, yes we need that.”
The mayor said he’s not sure where the affordable housing should go if the city receives money from other levels of government.
“But it shouldn’t be on the waterfront,” he insisted.
The issue goes to Ford’s executive committee for approval on Wednesday and, if it survives, would still have to be approved by city council next month.
Councillor Ana Bailao, the affordable housing committee chairman, stressed the project was about “building a community.”
“We are getting the 20% of land from the developer at no cost, we are paying construction costs — construction costs cost the same no matter if you are at the waterfront or Rexdale,” Bailao said.
“It is part of our official plan; it is how you develop a city. We don’t want to create ghettos ... there is only one kind of citizen and one kind of city we want to build and that is a mixed community.”
Councillor Doug Ford said the city has it “wrong” on this one.
The Etobicoke North (Ward 2) councillor questioned who would draw the names of the lucky people who will live on the lake.
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