Re: “Crying Wolf Over Gentrification”

In response to Crying wolf over gentrification, published July, 17, 2009.

This letter is in response to Gareth Du Plooy’s article Crying Wolf Over Gentrification published in the July 16 Uniter. First, I would like to thank Du Plooy and The Uniter for questioning the merits of an anti-gentrification stance in Spence. Certainly the 48 Spence residents who participated in our research last summer welcomed - just as Mr. Du Plooy does – the new amenities and improved housing stock Spence has received in approximately the past three years. Many low-income renters, however, cannot afford to enjoy Spence’s renaissance and thus severely qualified their endorsement of these changes. Most participants regretted that housing improvements are almost always accompanied by prohibitively high housing cost increases. Many low-income renters have been forced to take money from food budgets to pay raised rents. A majority of the 25 Spence landlords consulted for the same project reported replacing low-income renters with higher-income households, or intending to do so in the near future. In the case of low-income rooming houses this almost certainly results in homelessness for a great number of former residents. In the written report based on this research – which was conducted at the request of the Spence Neighbourhood Association – published in the Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives 2009 State of the Inner City Report (available at www.policyalternatives.ca/manitoba), I anticipated Du Plooy’s argument and called for greater public investment in guaranteed affordable housing units in Spence, rather than a halt to private investment. Bedbug-free apartments, breakfast joints and safe streets ought to be for everyone, not just those who can afford them.

– Owen Toews

Published in Volume 63, Number 30 of The Uniter (August 13, 2009)