Supporting affordable housing for those in need
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Summary
In this episode, Premier Rachel Notley delivers a keynote address at Onward Homes in Calgary, Alberta on the issue of affordable housing. Minister Notley highlights the importance of addressing Alberta s housing affordability crisis, and how the province is working with its housing partners to address the issue.
Transcript
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well good morning everybody and welcome first off let me thank the whole team here at onward
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homes for hosting us today for nearly 50 years onward homes has been working to ensure every
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calgarian has a safe appropriate and affordable place to call home and alberta's government is
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proud to call them one of our housing partners along with the dozen dozens i should say of other
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housing providers across the province that work together with my department each day to provide
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tens of thousands of affordable homes to albertans now more than ever though it is crucial to come up
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with solutions with our partners to to ensure albertans have homes that meet their needs
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this is why alberta is making significant investments in increasing the stock of
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affordable housing through measures like capital grants support for housing providers and rental
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assistance. For example, with our partners, we're investing $9 billion between now and 2031 to
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create 13,000 new units of affordable housing. That's in addition to the already 5,000 new
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units of affordable housing that we've created since 2019. We continue to invest in rent
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supplements, currently a quarter billion dollars going into rent supplements, providing tens of
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thousands of households for Albertans in our province. That's on top of the $5.1 billion
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dollars in affordability measures that alberta is investing in across the board to help albertans
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tackle the affordability crisis the most of any province and confederation on top of that we
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continue to focus on red tape reduction and infrastructure support to be able to make sure
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that our cities and our construction industry can build all the homes that we will need now
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and in the future which has resulted in alberta having the highest purpose-built rentals in our
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history the highest housing starts in our history including another historical month this last
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january where we saw in calgary the most housing starts in a january in the history of statistics
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and i want to stress that is the most critical thing that we can do for housing going forward
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is to continue to increase our supply to be able to make sure that we can maintain affordability
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in the market at the same time though we need to make sure that our existing affordable housing
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stock can remain open or if it is closed that it can be quickly repaired and brought back online
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quickly so it can continue to provide a safe place for albertans to call home and that's why we are
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We are working closely with our partners to make sure existing affordable housing is maintained
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Today, I'm going to announce another $1.2 million in this fiscal year to go into capital
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This funding will provide key repairs that will keep 245 more homes online and continue
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to provide a safe and affordable place for Alberta's families and seniors to call home.
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For example, Onward Homes has a 59-unit building that is housing low-income Albertans, families
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and seniors that is in need of a roof with this funding we can support onward homes to update
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that roof which will keep that building open and those homes open capital maintenance and renewal
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is a low-cost high-impact way that our government can keep housing available for albertans and it
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will continue to be a major focus of my department in the coming years because of the significant
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impact that it has which is why the province has invested this year alone 110 million dollars in
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capital maintenance and renewal to help existing affordable housing units stay online last summer
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for example i announced an additional 16 million dollars in new funding that ultimately brought 100
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units back online and ensured 300 units were able to stay open with today's announcement that will
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bring this number to a new to 645 units that otherwise would not be available for albertans
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i want to thank our partners including onward homes and others who continue to work with us to
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be able to make sure that we can meet the challenges that we see with the housing crisis
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in our country because of your hard work albertans alberta continues to lead the way in this country
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when it comes to the expansion of both attainable and affordable housing with real solutions that
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are having record-breaking results that benefit albertans and keeping our province the most
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affordable jurisdiction in the country thank you and i will now ask martina gila i always say it
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wrong CEO of Onward Homes to come and say a few words whoopsie thanks very much Minister Nixon
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and good morning everyone thank you for being here another cold day this is
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turning into a bit of a tradition for us I'll be brief in my remarks sound asset management
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is a cornerstone for providing safe and affordable homes the provincial investment will ensure that
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onboard residents can continue to enjoy quality homes for years to come calgary's need for
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affordable housing and particular the type of housing that we provide which is deep subsidy
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housing for those who are very low income that need continues to be pressing and i also want
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to say that the multi-family sector continues to be uh hit hard by pressures such as inflation
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increasing costs various fees and taxes and so this much needed investment will really help our
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bottom line and it will go a long way um and um you know i was thinking about this and this
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particular investment because we are investing in repairing uh building envelope and the roof
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will really quite literally provide roof over people's heads so we are really grateful to
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the province so thanks very much to minister nixon thanks very much to the provincial
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government for investing in onboard homes and in our residents and in our buildings thank you
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can we now have uh kyle from uh silvera kyle fawcett come up and say a few words
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yes uh well thank you very much and uh thank you minister uh for this uh much needed announcement
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uh as the minister uh indicated in his previous remarks uh investing in the capital maintenance
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and renewal of the existing housing stock is a low-cost way to make sure families and seniors
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uh remain housed through these challenging circumstances uh and uh you know not being
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able to keep the the current affordable housing stock open that we currently have uh would only
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acerbate the problem that we're currently facing so this is a a much welcome uh announcement um
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and it's important that we make sure you know as we're navigating uh through these challenging
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times and trying to deliver affordable housing for our our community members be it families or
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or seniors that we make sure that we're investing in all types of housing and whether it be for
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for seniors for families some that require deep subsidization and and others that require just
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a little bit of help and we believe that this funding will help keep a spectrum of housing
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available to those seeking safe affordable housing in today's current market the final
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thing that i i will just add is that you know as as we move forward and continue to work with the
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the minister and his government to address this significant challenge that we work collaboratively
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and we look for solutions that are both short, provide short-term relief and long-term relief
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to the housing sector. And with that, I, you know, again, want to thank the minister and his
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government uh for stepping up to the plate and supporting our organizations thanks so much kyle
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we're now going to move to our question and answers uh we're going to start with reporters
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in the room mike's at the back uh one question one follow-up so uh we'll start state your name
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and outlet thank you uh aaron with live our calgary minister 1.2 million dollars how many
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projects in calgary is this going to cover and when are the checks going to be in the mail
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uh checks will be in the mail immediately this is going to be funding in this fiscal year which is
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coming to an end one of the reasons why we're quickly adding uh this on as we get to the end
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of the budget year where we see some space and i want to make sure that we utilize it to create
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more units uh this will go to about seven major housing partners across the province will create
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245 more units across alberta on top of the uh the 400 units already created with that additional
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16 million dollars announced uh last summer detailed breakdown of calgary versus elsewhere
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we can provide you afterwards i don't have it right in front of me follow-up yeah is this going
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to funding really looking like in the 2024 budget you know i think uh i'm as you know i can't tell
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you what's going to be in the budget next week though i think that uh you will see in the budget
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that our government remains committed to tackling some of the great social issues of our time
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including housing while at the same time making sure that alberta remains an economic powerhouse
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in a fiscally strong province. I look forward to having more to say about that after Minister
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Horner puts the budget in next Thursday. What I will say though, and I alluded to it in my remarks,
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is that we see capital maintenance and renewal investments as one of the key ways forward,
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particularly in the short term as we work on housing. We are investing billions of dollars
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in affordable housing and attainable housing measures across the province, but it takes time
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to build things. And so what we've learned with this process is we can invest minimal money,
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frankly uh in capital maintenance compared to brand new projects with bigger results
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as far as the unit numbers now that has capacity of where that would end and that is not the only
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solution uh but i can uh you know i can assure housing providers that we see capital maintenance
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renewal investments as a key way going forward to help albertans any more questions on the floor
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i'll get you to specifics about onwards uh project that would come from this funding
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but this funding could be made available specifically to make sure that units will
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stay online or come online that cannot be available that could come to an investment
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like roofs elevators is often a common one where units have come offline or units themselves that
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may have a specific maintenance issues with them specifically for onward how
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they're using this funding I'll let Martina specify thanks for that and I
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don't have much to add the funding is for building envelope and roof roof
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replacements for this no not for this building I apologize no for a different
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property horizon 14 um just uh about about a kilometer away from here
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yes sorry i apologize yes this building was completed recently and it doesn't
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uh need a roof replacement so thanks for that clarification thanks colleen
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we're going to move to the phones operator first caller please
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I have more of a technical question on the Stronger Foundations plan, because you mentioned
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How much of that $9 billion is coming from the province, and what's the breakdown for
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I don't have the breakdown, obviously the whole $9 billion at the podium with me, but
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work very closely with our municipal partners our housing authority partners and the federal
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government uh to be able to do the stronger foundations plan which will result in 13 000
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new units we are we'll be looking at expanding the ambition of the stronger foundations plan based on
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the challenges that we're seeing with housing but that is the start of where we're at and
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been working on as a province for the last several years and the province's contribution to that
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would be in the billions catherine follow-up yeah on a on a unrelated note the the ndp are expected
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to have a news conference a little bit later specifically about bow valley housing and i know
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um that was a question that came up with the tourism strategy um and adding this immigration
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stream for um for service workers specifically um what what can we expect to see specifically
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for housing in bow valley well first just last year i believe we invested about 10 million dollars
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in an affordable housing project to help with staffing issues in the bow valley area
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we are interested in continuing to invest in affordable housing any community including
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camor that said the premier and i have been both clear municipalities that will not get projects
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approved and continue to shut down existing housing projects as camor has just done recently when it
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comes with with some of the housing projects that you see in the bow valley are not going to be
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communities going forward where there will be priority funding and so the number one thing that
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cammore and the bow valley need to do if they want to see large investments of affordable housing in
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their community from us or the federal government who have both been clear then they better start
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approving projects because our government is focused on getting money out the door shovels in
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the ground and units built for people to live in and are not interested in seeing multi-million
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dollar housing projects being blocked by municipal governments going forward so if bow valley wants
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to see more affordable housing of which i do believe that they need the very first step that
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they need to do is to start approve the projects that are already in place and have been through
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environmental assessments and make sure that we can build the doors that's needed in the
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bow valley for the future operator next caller thank you sandra stanway brooks bulletin good
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Good morning. This actually may be a follow-up to the previous question.
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Can you please speak to how the government is going to be helping rural communities,
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communities that have no affordable housing units at all left, please?
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Well, I think that that's a bit of a broad statement to say that there's communities in rural Alberta
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I think what you probably mean is that there are lots of communities that are at maximum capacity
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on things particularly like seniors housing, which is a common thing that we hear in rural Alberta.
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Our investments that I've just outlined here are for both urban and rural communities.
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We've announced dozens of projects over the last year across the province when it comes to helping rural Alberta.
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This announcement in particular around capital maintenance and renewal,
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one of the reasons that we wanted to move forward with this over the last year is because we saw big impacts when it comes to rural Alberta
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with lots of units that were offline and that could quickly come on with minimal investment.
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You'll see in the coming weeks as we lead up to the budget, as well as right after the budget,
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where we will continue to announce some pretty significant projects all across rural Alberta.
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I want to stress that this government will not leave rural Alberta behind,
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and they will continue to be a top priority for us when it comes to investing in housing.
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All right, that's all the time we have for the press conference today.
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just have Martina and Kyle come up for a photo op for the cameras. Thank you.