Seeking answers to Jasper’s perennial accommodation crunch

Advice from Jasper town councilor Brenda Zinck has brought me to a booth in Smitty’s, the neutral ground Anna (not her real name) chose to discuss the details of a room she wants to sublet for $700 a month. 

We eye each other speculatively, neither especially happy with the prospect of sharing living space with a total stranger, but willing to compromise for convenience, and necessity. 

Zinck is one of two council representatives on the Jasper Housing Authority, a body charged with finding a solution to the problem that one property manager says is the worst he has seen in almost 20 years of renting apartments here.The authority became a legal entity last year, but nothing more has been done, Zinck says, and won’t be “until Parks Canada releases land and we can plan a building for it. There is nothing we can do.”

Her advice to temporary and permanent workers who descend on Jasper every spring, looking for jobs and a place to live:  Check the ads in the newspapers, look at the bulletin boards in the Employment Centre, at the Atha-B, outside Freewheel and Super A Foods.

There are three ads in the classifieds. A person experienced with the Jasper housing market warns me away from two of them. Anna is the third, and we quickly realize that it isn’t going to work. More than 100 jobs are posted at the Employment Centre. The Super A board has a handful of accommodation postings, but they are all by people looking for a place to stay.

“That’s the way it works in Jasper,” explains Todd Noble, who sits on a housing committee established by Jasper Tourism and Commerce. “It’s mostly by word-of-mouth referrals. Renters put their names up and wait for a call from someone with a place to rent.”

It has been this way for 40 years or more, says Noble, and he doesn’t see any prospect for immediate change.

The lack of urgency to find solutions to the housing shortage sounds like an echo from the municipality’s satisfaction survey. It found that 77 per cent of residents who have lived in Jasper for a decade own their homes; they don’t have issues with rent  -  unless it’s how much to charge tourists for that spare room in the basement.

Approved accommodations were identified in the 2002 study of the town’s housing as one of the features that cuts into the stock of  long-term rental apartments, inflates home prices and skews a real estate market that government policy limits to a select group: people who operate businesses in Jasper, work here, or have retired after working here for at least five years.

In 2002, Parks Canada removed the cap on approved accommodations. Since then, the number of operators has remained at 163; the number of rooms has actually slipped to 295 from 325, but without any apparent increase in the number of apartments available to rent.

The 2002 housing study set out several goals for affordable housing: 10-15 rooms at $5 per day for short-term stay; 50 rental units with 120 beds at $280-480 per month; 70 apartments or townhouses at $500-700 per month; 80 apartments, townhouses or for-purchase condos at $1300 per month; 25 independent living condos at $1200 per month; 10 limited support rental housing units for seniors. 

According to Barry Romanko, manager of realty and municipal services at Parks Canada, 81 housing units with 170 new bedrooms have been built here over the past six years. Ten new condominium units approved earlier this year will provide another 26 bedrooms and the Sweetgrass Housing Co-op could add another 40-60 homes in the next two years.

In theory, renters moving into their own homes should free up apartments, but so far that hasn’t happened. Dave Neilson of  Urbanlife Management said that in 16 years of managing rental properties in Jasper, he has never seen supply and demand so tight.

“The lack of rental accommodation is affecting businesses,” said Neilson. “They can’t hire staff if they can’t house them, so they are cutting back on hours of operation.”

Not all of the 81 new units have opened, Romanko said. When they do, he expects some slack in Jasper’s rental market, “but we don’t want to get too far ahead of demand.”  

Parks Canada’s cautious management of the market and building height restrictions reflect the prevailing view of residents, who prefer neighbourhoods of single family homes and don’t want high-density developments near their backyards. That puts a squeeze on key institutions in Jasper.

Seton Health Care Centre provides accommodation to new staff, but encourages them to find their own places after six months. Lorna Chisholm, health care centre manager, said the steady rise in housing costs over the past several years has become an issue in retaining staff.

“Eventually, people want to own a home. But even for those earning good salaries, Jasper is out of their league. If they want to own a home, they have to move,” she said.

Teachers fend for themselves. Dale Karpluk, principal of the junior and senior high school, has played host to new teachers, sometimes for as long as three months. She retires this year. Her successor has been chosen – subject to finding a suitable home.

“We don’t anticipate a problem,” said Cory Gray, human resources manager for Grande Yellowhead Regional Division. “It’s a senior position, with a salary to match and most communities in Alberta have seen increases in housing prices similar to those in Jasper.”

Compared to the reality of today’s mortgage and rent payments, the cost estimates of the 2002 housing study seem like lines from a fairy tale. In the two years since the Sweetgrass Housing Co-op started negotiating for land with Parks Canada, construction costs have risen steadily, to well over $200 a square foot. 

The question for those who signed on with the co-op is: can they still afford one of the units? Keith Shepherd, chairman of the co-op, said they are now considering pre-fabricated modules and are looking as far away as Idaho for the best possible deal.

The same factors discourage private developers from building in Jasper. Jim Webb of Urbanlife Management said developers can’t be allowed “to build crap in a national park, but the government, Parks Canada, has to make more land available, allow for greater density – or do both. Those are the only ways to provide affordable housing.”

The issues will be open for discussion again this fall when Jasper’s community plan comes up for review. It will take a year to assess and report on what residents want for the town and another year or more to translate that into action that might ease the housing crunch.