Any hopes for quick movement towards new affordable housing developments in Jasper have been dashed, at least for now. 

The Municipality of Jasper had submitted a proposal to Parks Canada’s national office in late 2005, but the local authorities have since learned that they will have to discuss their plans further with local officials before they can be considered by Parks Canada’s upper echelon.

Jasper Mayor Richard Ireland met with Parks CEO Alan Latourelle when he was in Ottawa on business earlier this year, and he discovered that further consultation on the local level was necessary.

“I did have a meeting with Alan, and he and I seem to have crossed wires a bit,” Ireland said. The key to the proposal is the release fee for the land that any future housing development will be built on. This fee has to be approved by the federal Treasury Board.

“Whatever solution we find has to pass muster at Treasury Board,” said Ireland. “I was under the impression that was something that had to go through the national office, but the indication is that Alan would like council to sit down with Ron Hooper and Barry Romanko to develop a joint proposal.”

Ireland accentuated the positive, saying that local Parks officials could be more informed about Treasury Board expectations, but admitted that having to take a step sideways was somewhat frustrating.

“It’s just the nature of the beast I guess,” he said. “It would be nice if there was a more streamlined way to deal with it.”

Ireland hopes that town and Parks staff will have the opportunity to mull over the proposal in an all-day 

session sometime in the next month.

Meanwhile, a promising suggestion that the regionally-based Evergreens Foundation could be getting into the affordable housing game has come to naught.

The foundation is primarily concerned with providing seniors’ accommodations in the Yellowhead region, and executive director Dennis Puchailo confirmed that the group would be returning to this root objective.

“At this point the board wants us to focus on seniors’ needs,” he said. “We have a meeting later this month with (West Yellowhead MLA) Ivan Strang to further discuss affordable housing and we’ll have a better idea after that exactly how we can help.”

Although Puchailo had been keen to pursue the option of building a series of low-cost units in the various communities of the region, including Jasper, the board would prefer that the Evergreens Foundation function as a resource for other groups that want to take up the challenge of providing affordable housing.

“I think that’s where it’s going to go,” Puchailo said. “We’re going to be giving people all the knowledge we can with regards to grants and where they can find sources of 

support and funding.”

Although he doubts that the foundation board will make a complete about-face in the near future, Puchailo admits that he was fairly certain that he had the foundation supporting the move towards affordable housing just a few short months ago. 

“I’ve been wrong before, and they may say that we need to go to the next step, which is to commission a full feasability study for the low-cost projects.”

Until that unlikely day, Jasperites will have to wait, and hope that the wheels of bureaucracy turn more quickly than they have been.