麻豆视频

Sask. Housing made several changes to their policies in July last year and the repercussions of which is now being seen with the rental units in Carlyle.

There are currently three senior housing units in Carlyle, Golden Heritage Court, East View and West View apartments. There are 20 units at the West View location and there are currently six units not occupied which was a result of the Sask Housing changes. The rule stipulates that non-seniors are no longer able to rent available senior units and the manger at the Carlyle Housing Authority Marylin Carter says she doesn't know if Sask Housing will ever lift that policy.

She explained that the policy was a local one as the local board found that the West View location was frequently unoccupied and the policy was implemented to help with the ongoing housing crisis in the area.

"Our board allowed non-seniors to move into West View because it was the place we always had vacant units. It seems to be the least desirable for seniors to move into because a lot of them would prefer Golden Heritage which has a common hallway and there's a little bit more opportunity for sociability," she said.

"Normally those six at West View would have non-seniors living there so that would take some of the crunch off people looking for rentals."

She did however point out that younger seniors seemed to prefer the West View units to Golden Heritage Court.

Another policy change that is apparently preventing seniors from applying for housing is the change in their damage deposit policy and the prerequisites that allows one to qualify.

Carter explained that the damage deposit was set at $125 but was changed to a month's rent and rent itself was also raised to 30 per cent of a tenant's gross income.

"If a senior has over $32,000 per year, if that's their total amount of money they get for the year and if their assets are over $200,000 then they become what are considered a non-eligible senior," Carter said explaining the new stipulations set by Sask Housing.

She said individuals who fit in this category can still occupy a unit but will have to pay a market rental price of $860 which is for a one bedroom and $1,215 for a two bed room.

She stressed that couples who make slightly above $32,000 a year will be economically challenged especially those who require a two bedroom.

"I know Sask Housing when the senior and family units were put into place for low income they started to look at the revenue and where it was coming from. And it was coming from people who had high enough incomes to rent in the private sector rather than being subsidized so I understand where they are coming from," she said.

"But even with our one bedrooms here [West View], if we had to charge $860 that's definitely more than the affordable apartments. But what we were doing was renting to non-seniors and then moving them to the apartments when they became available.

Carter said the upside to all these changes is that current occupants of both the senior and low income units in town will not be affected unless there is a change in their lease arrangements. But she still believes that prices could be set a little lower for the units. She said Sask Housing will be holding a meeting in the spring where the board members of local housing authorities have been requested to attend and discuss relevant issues.

"I am only assuming that the managers will be addressed at some workshops just to see what our thoughts are. But we have [managers] sent on our thoughts to our area manager on this," she said. "I don't know what they are going to really address but there is a group of seniors that are falling in the cracks I feel so bad, we have six empty units here that we could be filling."

Carter said if Sask Housing does not find a need for certain units they will eventually be sold.