Oak Bay Council received a report this week showing that, so far, they're missing their provincial housing targets.
"So far, at six months in, we're at seven units completed and occupied," Says Mayor Kevin Murdoch. He says the seven are all all secondary suites created as part of existing homes and approved before the BC Government gave them targets numbers.
Oak Bay's goal for this year is 56 units occupied, with a further goal of 684 by the end of five years.
"We found out, to no surprise, that we're not at the target numbers yet. But we knew that. In fact, that was are response back when the province asked for feedback after making the decision - that we were willing participants but we knew it was going to be really hard to make those targets.
Murdoch says Oak Bay is willing, but faces challenges like high land prices and the fact that Oak Bay is fully built-out, "we're a willing partner in that experiment but I think we are going to need some provincial help if we're going to really meet those targets."
Oak Bay was one of the first municipalities to be handed housing targets by the province. This week, several more local communities were added to the list including Esquimalt, Central Saanich, North Saanich, Sidney, View Royal, Colwood.