Halifax Population Grows By 9,000, Adds 17 New Companies During Pandemic
HALIFAX — Mayor Mike Savage believes Halifax will continue to grow and thrive in 2021, despite some economic challenges facing the city. Savage made his case at his annual State of the Municipality address on February 11.
The event, hosted by the Halifax Chamber of Commerce, gave Savage a platform to paint of picture of Halifax as a growing city that’s navigated Covid-19 better than most of the rest of Canada.
Savage backed up his claim with some strong evidence.
In 2020, 9,015 new residents came to Halifax, making the city the second-fastest growing city in Canada.
Halifax also fared better than the country as a whole when it came to employment.
In Canada, employment dropped 4.4 percent last year as more than 825,000 people lost their jobs. But in Halifax, employment rose by two percent, which was better than any other Canadian city.
Savage also pointed out that 17 new companies set up shop since the pandemic hit, bringing thousands of new jobs with them.
“When companies are coming here during Covid it tells a number of things. First of all, we have a good business environment, but secondly, people appreciate the safety and the ability to do their business in a city like Halifax,” he said.
“There are things to celebrate,” the mayor argued.
However, he acknowledged things in the city are by no means perfect.
Affordable Housing Still An Issue
Halifax’s impressive growth remains tightly wound with the city’s struggle with affordable housing.
The City council has approved more than 11,000 new units of housing in the city over the last three years, something Savage noted is “a marked acceleration.” The city’s vacancy rate also went up in 2020. However, the new 1.9 percent vacancy rate is still far lower than it would be in a healthy market
And over the same period three-year period the city paved the way for 11,000 new housing units, more than 25,000 people moved here.
“We’re not in any danger of having more units available than people any time soon,” Savage said.
The mayor pointed out that the federal and provincial governments control many of the levers policymakers can pull to combat rising housing costs. However, there are things the city can do.
“As a city, we can actually impact housing affordability in a number of different ways. We don’t do rent control or things like that, but we can look at the costs of building affordable housing and say, ‘what can we do?’” he said.
He said affordable housing should be exempt from the fees and permit costs levied at traditional developments. Other measures, like giving city-owned land to not-for-profit organizations that build affordable housing, can also help.
Savage also pointed to work the city is doing to regulate Airbnb rentals in Halifax, and laws passed last year that cleared the way for secondary suites across a large swath of the city.
Savage said focusing more on areas outside the urban core of Halifax will be a key to the city’s housing challenges.
“We’ve done a great job of densifying the core of Halifax but we now have growth areas like Port Wallace, parts of Bedford, and other parts of Dartmouth that we need to get people into,” he said.
He said he’s spoken to developers interested in building in those areas but that densifying them “will have to be accelerated. As those areas develop the city will also have to support them with better infrastructure and transit access.
In Bedford, for example, Savage said he expects to see a new Bedford Library and a ferry within five-to-10 years.
“The growth of that area is just natural,” he said.
Many Businesses Still Struggling
Savage called the “inequity of Covid” one of the toughest parts of recovering from the economic impacts of the virus.
“Some [businesses] have done fine. You know, the liquor store has done fine but restaurants haven’t. And Sobeys seems to have done okay and Superstore…. Some retailers have done well, but many others have been hurt significantly,” he said.
“We’re not finished with business closings by any stretch,” he continued. “There are people who have been hanging on and having on and we’re going to see some more bad news”
He said the city can play a role in helping those businesses out, but it requires cooperation with all levels of government.
The Halifax Chamber of Commerce has pushed the city to give more tax relief to businesses suffering from the economic hardship wrought by the pandemic.
Savage argued the city can’t keep spending and providing services without tax revenue but said chamber and council are “not as far apart on taxes” as some might think.
“We haven’t set the tax rate yet,” he said.