Tenants needed help yesterday. Where is New Brunswick's promised rent bank?
CBC
Ashley Voutour isn't where she thought she'd be at 32.
Less than a year ago, she had full-time employment and an apartment of her own in the Saint John area. With two dogs, inflation and sky-rocketing grocery prices, Voutour's $60,000 annual salary was just enough to keep her head above water.
Now, she's living with family and struggling to find somewhere affordable to live in the fall.
"September is coming and I need to find a place and the price alone … I don't know what the solution is, but it's really, really sad."
After being laid off from her job following the strike at the Canada Revenue Agency this spring, Voutour had to give up the two-bedroom apartment where she'd been paying $1,250 per month. Months after moving in with relatives in Quispamsis, it's time for her to start looking for her own place again.
But everything she's seeing is around $1,400 a month — a far cry from a two-bedroom apartment she had in 2019, where she paid $750. The other day, Voutour clicked on an advertisement to take over someone's lease and was shocked to find it would cost her more than $2,000 a month.
Including first and last month's rent, Voutour would need close to $3,000, at the minimum, to secure an apartment, not to mention moving expenses and start-up fees for wifi and utilities.
Not everyone has that kind of cash floating around, including Voutour, who tried without luck to see if some landlords would take a security deposit in instalments.
It's one of the barriers a rent bank, announced by New Brunswick's Department of Social Development earlier this summer, could help eradicate.
The province promised to spend $3 million over the next two years to help up to 750 households annually, including both families and individuals, avoid eviction or obtain new rental accommodations, a benefit designed for low-to-mid income earners.
The program was announced without a timeline, eligibility criteria or repayment terms. As recently as July 31, the province couldn't confirm when the rent bank will be available.
"The province and its partners continue to work together to finalize the details on the Rent Bank. Government understands the importance of this initiative and will take the time necessary to complete the work," a spokesperson for the Department of Social Development wrote in an email to CBC News.
The only additional detail the province could confirm is that the loans will be interest-free. The department did not respond to a request for an interview with Social Development Minister Jill Green.
For Tobin LeBlanc Haley, an assistant professor with the University of New Brunswick's sociology department who works with the N.B. Coalition for Tenants Rights, the well-publicized announcement paired with a lack of details is unsurprising.
The Rachel Notley government's consumer carbon tax wound up becoming a weapon the UCP wielded to drum the Alberta NDP out of office. But that levy-and-repayment program, and the wide-ranging "climate leadership plan" around it, also stood as the NDP's boldest, provincial-reputation-altering move in their single-term tenure.