This is the site, located at the intersection of Ospika Boulevard and Tyner Boulevard, where the seniors housing will be built

By Tommy Osborne

Senior Housing

New housing development takes big step forward

Jan 14, 2025 | 4:48 PM

PRINCE GEORGE – A housing development years in the making took a big step forward at Monday’s City Council meeting, as a significant amendment to a planned housing development was approved by Council. In August of 2021, a development from HUB Collections LTD in collaboration with Praxis Solutions was approved to build 256 student housing units, but Monday’s council meeting saw this amended to instead be for 118 seniors home apartments.

“Our population is always going to age, so this kind of housing is crucial for an aging population to feel like they have somewhere to go and stay within our community. Seniors housing is a key part of housing makeup in our city,” Councillor Kyle Sampson said.

This development was heavily discussed in 2023, as the amendment to change from student to seniors housing was brought up twice before, but rejected both times by council. However, council was convinced that it’s the right move now, and Councillor Ron Polillo credits the developers for heavily engaging with the community and amending the original plans in a way that makes sense for both the City and the developers.

“There is a need for seniors housing. The fact that they engaged the community and did, I believe, a pretty good job, a robust job, of engagement and actually reaching out to Council of Seniors and Elder Citizens Recreation and using that feedback and incorporating it in the different design. To me, they did their homework and they put the work in,” Polillo said.

While seniors housing is gained, this amendment does come with the loss of potential student housing. Was there any concern that this would negatively impact the younger generations? Both Polillo and Sampson don’t believe so.

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“I think we need to address each need separately, and this developer chose to address the need for seniors housing. (…) The fact that UNBC is looking to expand in their student housing is a way of them responding to that need too, because I know for many years that is a concern, the fact that they need more student housing there at the university. So I’m really encouraged to see that they have a plan to increase that student housing it looks like by about 150 units,” Polillo said.

“There’s a variety of housing needs, and this is just one component of it. So to have a developer who is committed to Prince George is nice to see. And although we had some speed bumps along the way, I think we’ve gotten to a place where the community will benefit from a development here in Prince George that is going to provide a need and fill a need in the housing market,” Sampson said.

Other factors, like the federal government’s cap on international students, could also play a role in a relatively lighter demand for student housing compared to senior housing in the future. This, on top of the City making sure it was doing its due diligence when faced with such a large scale amendment to an already agreed upon development for student housing.

“Originally it was based on a certain size development that would generate a certain revenue of taxes that would provide a certain amount of housing units for people in our community so we want to make sure that’s what the whole deal is framed on. When changing those terms, you want to make sure that you’re not getting shortchanged or getting less as a city. We want to make sure that the developer is meeting those needs and fulfilling their obligations to our city, and I believe that we’ve gotten to that point finally with them. So it’s great news.” Sampson said.

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