Voters in Westminster may get the chance this November to tinker with the very gears and guts of democracy. The City Council is weighing a proposed ballot measure that would split Westminster into three pieces — each to be represented by a council member with closer ties to city neighborhoods and the people who live … Read more
A new report by Statistics Canada shows the country’s total number of short-term rental listings increased by more than 60 per cent between 2017 and 2023, while the number of short-term rental units that could be used as long-term housing grew by more than 80 per cent. The report identified more than 100,000 short-term rentals that … Read more
President Joe Biden’s proposal this week to cap rent increases in larger apartment buildings across America has elevated an idea that’s long been embraced by progressive housing advocates in Colorado — but, in a split among Democrats, is opposed by Gov. Jared Polis. What’s more, at the local level, rent-stabilization policies are essentially illegal under … Read more
Mortgage debt grew at its slowest pace in 23 years in February, amid high borrowing costs and reservations related to the Bank of Canada’s key interest rate — but the slowdown likely won’t last, according to Canada’s housing agency. Canadian mortgage debt totalled $2.16 trillion that month, up 3.4 per cent from the same period last year — a historically low … Read more
The suite of landmark zoning and land-use reform laws passed by Colorado lawmakers this year should help alleviate the housing crisis, national experts say, while catapulting the Centennial State into the ranks of other housing pioneers. But those experts cautioned that the reforms seeded this winter and spring will take years to bear fruit. New … Read more
Unlike last year, the end of the Colorado legislative session Wednesday came with no fireworks — no protest walkouts, no intracaucus tensions boiling over into public, no last-minute implosions of keystone policy bills. The final day of lawmakers’ nearly four-month session instead was dominated by noticeably brighter spirits as the General Assembly put the finishing … Read more
It’s hard to get 260 Alberta municipal governments to agree on much, which is why their blanket organization seldom has anything provocative to say. What advocacy points can members as disparate as Calgary, Lethbridge, the town of Two Hills and the villages of Czar, Barons and Bawlf agree on? Safer fare, typically — suggestions that … Read more
Updated at 3:10 p.m. April 27: The bill that’s the centerpiece of this year’s attempted land-use reforms by Democrats in the Colorado legislature and Gov. Jared Polis has run into potential trouble, facing an uncertain fate in a Senate committee. House Bill 1313, which seeks to increase denser residential development in transit-rich areas, stalled in … Read more
Gov. Jared Polis signed a bill into law Monday that officially eliminates most restrictions on how many unrelated roommates can live together in Colorado. House Bill 1007 prohibits local governments from enacting occupancy limits, which Polis and other critics of the policy have derided as discriminatory and outdated. Roughly two dozen Colorado cities have such … Read more
Transgender and nonbinary people would be better protected from harassment in Colorado under new bill Transgender and nonbinary people would receive more explicit protections in Colorado’s anti-bias and harassment law if a newly introduced bill becomes law. Advocates characterize the bill as a simple legislative fix to ensure gender identity and expression are protected across … Read more
