Opinion: Tsawwassen can't reject new housing and expect better services | Daily Hive

Opinion: Tsawwassen can't shut the door to new housing and still expect better services

September 2025 revised downsized concept for the redevelopment of Tsawwassen Town Centre. (Arcadis/Century Group)

Written for Daily Hive Urbanized by Russil Wvong, who is a volunteer housing advocate with the Vancouver Area Neighbours Association.

Last month, a divided Delta City Council rejected a downsized redevelopment application for Tsawwassen Town Centre that would have built 600 apartments and included space for a medical clinic. Originally, the developer had proposed 1,400 homes.

Although the project was scaled back, Delta’s municipal officials also expressed their frustration at another shutdown of the emergency room at Delta Hospital in Ladner — due to staffing shortages.

What may not be obvious is that the two are related.

When we have a region-wide shortage of housing, prices and rents rise to unbearable levels, pushing people out. High housing costs translate into low real salaries: after you pay for rent or a mortgage, there is not much left over. So then, it is hard to convince people to move here, and we end up with labour shortages.

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The problem in Metro Vancouver is that we have a mismatch between housing and jobs. People move where the jobs are. This is a big region, with lots of specialized jobs that do not exist in smaller places. And it is also a nice place to live, so many people retire here. Whenever somebody retires from a job, somebody else needs to move here to fill that job, and they need a place to live. Because we have an older population, we also need a lot of people to work in healthcare.

Land here is limited by the ocean and the mountains, so to add more housing, we need to build up.

Previous preliminary concept in 2024:

Tsawwassen Town Centre mall redevelopment Delta

Preliminary concept of the Tsawwassen Town Centre Mall redevelopment. (Arcadis/Century Group)

September 2025 revised downsized concept:

tsawwassen town centre redevelopment concept september 2025

September 2025 revised downsized concept for the redevelopment of Tsawwassen Town Centre. (Arcadis/Century Group)

But every apartment building must be approved one at a time — by a vote of the local City Council. This is a very slow and difficult process: people like their neighbourhood the way it is, so there’s often vocal opposition.

The difficulty of building new housing has resulted in a severe housing shortage across the entire region, with vacancy rates hovering near zero and unbearably high prices and rents. This was aggravated when the pandemic hit, and there were suddenly more people working from home and needing more space, although more recently, the combination of increased supply and weaker demand has helped bring down prices and rents.

The provincial government has passed legislation requiring municipal governments to decide on an Official Community Plan (OCP) — providing greater predictability, rather than depending on individual site-by-site rezoning approvals. In particular, if a rezoning application is consistent with the OCP, there is no public hearing. But this does not mean that City Council will automatically approve the application. They are still subject to political pressure.

September 2025 revised downsized concept for the redevelopment of Tsawwassen Town Centre. (Arcadis/Century Group)

The proposal to redevelop Tsawwassen Town Centre was consistent with Delta’s OCP, which prescribes that up to 24 storeys will be allowed for the site, where there is a significant public benefit. In this case, the community contribution would have been a 6500 sq. ft. space for a medical clinic, donated to the Delta Hospital Foundation. But City Council still rejected it.

It is natural for residents in Tsawwassen to want better access to healthcare. Expanding access to healthcare services makes the most sense where you have a growing population. And providing more healthcare services means that you need more workers — more nurses, more doctors, and their families, all needing a place to live. All of this adds up to more growth.

September 2025 revised downsized concept for the redevelopment of Tsawwassen Town Centre. (Arcadis/Century Group)

At the same time, when a developer says, “Look, lots of people want to live here, let’s build housing for them,” it is also natural for people who already live in Tsawwassen to want to minimize changes to their neighbourhood. Many Tsawwassen residents already find traffic unbearable. It is a car-oriented place. They chose to live in Tsawwassen because it is quieter, while still close enough to be able to get to Vancouver if they really need to. It is understandable for people to organize and put pressure on City Council to reject the application.

Ultimately, you have to decide what is more important: increased growth with better services (such as healthcare) or limited growth with reduced services.

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