Liberals would work to lower property taxes, bring in better deal on housing

Liberal Leader Zach Churchill said Friday that his party has a plan for the construction of 80,000 homes in Nova Scotia by 2032.

“A Nova Scotia Liberal government will build more houses. The best way to lower prices is by building more homes, including more deeply affordable homes. More housing being built will result in more affordable housing for Nova Scotians,” he said.

The Liberal plan would support the building of 11,000 new homes per year, which Churchill says is enough to accommodate Nova Scotia’s population growth and aid the housing crisis. The plan would not include public housing.

“This crisis has hit a pinnacle because Tim Houston refuses to put an end to his reckless plan to double our population. We don’t have enough housing supply to keep up with Mr. Houston’s plan for growth,” said Churchill.

The announcement comes after the Liberals released their official platform on Monday.

Churchill said the Liberals would eliminate restrictive zoning covenants, speed up home building development and place the municipal funding formula under review.

The zoning changes intended by the Liberals would begin with an investment of $20 million into a fund to “help municipalities speed up permitting, improve zoning, and get housing built faster,” the party said in a statement.

The Progressive Conservative platform pledges to create a first-time homeowners program “making home ownership more achievable” and using vacant land to make way for affordable housing.

Nova Scotia’s NDP would ease the building of 30,000 new affordable rental homes by leveraging federal funding and working with municipalities to identify prime land for housing.

Churchill said “we would remove unfair penalties from our property taxes” and “will work with experts to launch a full review of the property tax system to lower property taxes, especially in high-taxed areas.”

This initiative would also eliminate the deed transfer tax to help downsizing seniors and first-time home buyers, said the Liberal party in a statement.

The Liberals would also invest in non-profit and co-op housing.

“Our goal is to create 2,000 new co-op units by 2032.”

He said housing is every Nova Scotian’s basic need and everyone deserves both housing and also a place to call home.

He said the plan acknowledges the struggles of the province’s young people who cannot find adequate and affordable places to call home.

“We have heard from a lot of young people across this province who are actually losing hope in being able to afford a future here. We want to give hope back to those people,” he said.

Churchill criticized the platforms of his opponents, particularly the NDP. He described the NDP platform as “woefully inadequate.”

“The NDP plan to build 500 government houses? That’s not enough. We need 80,000 houses,” he said.

“We need major reform to get our province out of the housing crisis we’re in.”