The Calgary affordable housing idea that divides conservatives, federal and local

Two things are traditionally true of many (if not most) Calgary city councillors.

They want to address the lack of affordable housing. They also want to avoid giving discomfort to the many homeowners who love how far away they live from lower-cost duplexes, row houses or apartments, and how hard it is for anyone to build those types of homes near them.

These two values clashed loudly this week, and the results at city hall were rather messy. 

Late Tuesday, council voted 8-7 to reject an entire set of a task force's proposals to ease the affordability crisis, because a few recommendations called for easing Calgary's restrictive residential zoning rules.

What ensued was a cross-partisan public drubbing of a council that would dare thumb its nose at those struggling to afford their rent or mortgages.

Within 24 hours, council undid that blunt rejection. In a 14-1 makeup vote, it gave a tentative endorsement to its housing task force's ideas.

This compromise path leaves several opportunities for councillors to ultimately reject reforms that would trigger anxiety among homeowners who prefer their neighbourhoods the way they are, as row upon row of stand-alone houses.

The vote and re-vote does not change or solve anything immediately. Rent costs and home prices are growing beyond the reach of many residents, and the influx of newcomers is making it all tougher.

But with this task force report, and the sharp outcry its brief rejection triggered, Calgary has been thrust into a new zoning debate that almost certainly gets testy and divisive — and perhaps nowhere more than within conservative political circles.

Think back to the long civic feud about secondary suites, which dragged on for more than a decade until council in 2018 made it so homeowners no longer needed a council public hearing each time one wanted to add a legal basement apartment into a house.

The councillors who had been most receptive to the years of pushback on reforming suite rules were conservatives, including some who are still at the table: Sean Chu, Andre Chabot and Peter Demong.

This week, the affordable housing task force's 33 calls to action included Calgary adopting a bylaw next year that would end the zones called R-1 and R-C1 that allow only stand-alone homes in most residential areas. Instead a newer zoning designation called R-CG would be expanded city-wide, and permit row houses, side-by-sides and duplexes throughout Calgary neighbourhoods.

It's designed to greatly increase the number of new units built in Calgary, beyond new highrises or edge suburbs, adding supply at lower costs. The change would be more sweeping than the one that permitted secondary suites wherever owners wanted them, and would require a major public hearing and future council vote.

The councillors who voted this week to cut off any such movement were, once again, the more conservative-leaning members, including those who aligned themselves with federal party leader Pierre Poilievre (Dan McLean), ran provincially for the Progressive Conservatives (Chu), or Wildrose (Terry Wong), or tried to become a UCP candidate (Chabot).