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I feel like everyone is reading this wrong. This probably isn't about people living in campers, it's about seasonal camp sites.
In northwestern Ontario and I assume north eastern, its extremely common to have 10-20 campers set up at every lake and boat launch from may long to labour day
Lots of those are also on crown land; which is legal you just got to move every few weeks.
But a lot of northerners are fiercly protective of their crownloand "campsite" during summer and hunting seasons.
I agree. but my comment is referring to all the talk about poverty and the housing crisis when this bylaw seems to be entirely about unofficial seasonal camp sites
How would bylaw even know? How would they enter someone's property? And how do they know it is being used, can't someone claim that they just parked it without using it?
This seems like draconian state over reach. Aside from collecting trash what services are they using that these municipalites are providing. Which doesn't even make sense, isn't garbage pickup limited to a certain amount?
I just do not get any of this. If I owned a property up in some rural area and decided to invite 1000 people to camp out for a week and enjoy some music what does the municipality have to do with it? Assuming I clean up and don't charge entry, what business is it of theirs who I invite to my weeklong party? And if they came in a trailer but took the wheels off does that still make it a trailer? Or a tent?
So many questions and annoyances at this.
Bylaw enforcement officers can enter someone's property to enforce bylaws. As the mayor explained in the article, they use city resources (fire, police, ambulance, roads) so should pay their fair share.
Depends. Will a significant percentage of your town's vacant lots be hosting the same kind of crowd at the same time? If not, it won't much matter, but if so, sure, every noticeable increase in expenditures ought to trigger a corresponding user fee, in order for the vacant lot party animals to not piggy-bank on regular taxpayers in a significant way.
I understand your logic but making the point rhetorically. What is the point of owning land if for every time you wish to do something you need permission and to pay a fee?
I read that - but is this not what the land taxes are for? Why not raise those which is the way other forms of land users pay into those services? Why make it something special?
That's what property taxes are for, yes. But rates for vacant land are very low, which is fair because it is, well, vacant, and hence owners don't use the above resources. Since the property ceases to be vacant when someone plops a number of trailers on it, an adjustment is necessary to ensure taxation is fair to all the taxpayers.
It probably doesn't much matter when your town is large (tax base is large) and the number of such trailers is fairly low, but obviously in the town they talk about in the article it started to become a financial burden.
as soon as me and T get power and water up in this Ma, then this van is going to fall under the same jurisdiction of every other trailer up in this Ma! hold on! Randy it's the fashion police, you're being charged 500 bucks for wearing dem pants after labor day lol 😂
Everyone defending this has clearly never seen these encampments first hand. It doesn't take long before it's completely littered with trash then abandoned and done elsewhere.
It's ridiculous. They absolutely need to be held accountable and pay for the services listed like the rest of us.
Us being in housing crisis is no excuse, because we are ALL in a housing crisis. You don't just get to stop paying for waste disposal and dump your trash wherever you please. F**K THAT!
There was one guy who did this at a boat launch.... it was great. Single guy, kept it clean. Always had a presence there all summer long and kept the cars safe. Cars were left for days as people went to cabins.
He was ordered to leave. Two years later vandals slashed almost every tire and broke in every car. Not saying it wouldn't have happened with him there, but still
> Everyone defending this has clearly never seen these encampments first hand. It doesn't take long before it's completely littered with trash then abandoned and done elsewhere.
Many people north of the GTA saw what the Torontians did to the communities during COVID. So many loud mfs trampling waterways to have their gaggle of kids run around while they have a BBQ in a protected greenspace. Fuck Toronto people.
>To work?
Not sure which country you're from but here in Canada the median salary is 41k and the median posted rent is 26k.
Working class people can't afford alternatives.
I knew an old MNR guy, when he saw a hunt/fish camp he'd make notes about the plates, get their names and addresses when he was checking their licenses, and he would let them know that he'd be back by after they left to check that they left if clean, and he would. But yeah some of the shit you find in the middle of nowhere, I swear you can be camping far out of range of cell towers and roads and still find mystery dumps of shit you can't imagine anyone humping in there to begin with.
Yes the garbage is the most visible problem. But if they all pitched in and paid for a dumpster hauled each week to a landfill- what else would they need. Do they have electricity, sewer and water?
If they were the types to pay for those services they'd live in actual trailer parks and not rest stops and other illegal areas.
You're missing the point on just what kind of people these folks are.
Yes. This is what happened in HRM. The trailers had no where to go and they managed to keep water and electricity, garbage disposal open through this winter. Not sure if it will be permanent or not. But it apparently kept quite a few people out of tents. AND in a prime location as well.
There is nothing wrong with living on land you own on a trailer.
Also, I don't think it is unreasonable for people to pay for the services they are using.
Bare land is often taxed in a different way than land with a dwelling on it. Those living on land without a dwelling are potentially forging paying for the services they use, like policing, fire, etc.
The services they consume without payment will just need to be covered by other taxpayers.
A $400 a year permit seems very reasonable to address the imbalance between funding and service use.
>Bare land is often taxed in a different way than land with a dwelling on it.
I grew up near a campground like this. The seasonal campers are basically cottages. Most have power, TV & Internet, and some even have decks & little gardens.
But they still have wheels, so despite obviously being parked there permanently (all year), they aren't technically buildings for tax purposes.
It's both hilarious and a bit fucked.
>There is nothing wrong with living on land you own on a trailer.
When it becomes a permanent dwelling there are issues that need to be addressed for the safety of the occupants and neighbours
1. Where does the poop go? A permanent resident (or multiple residents) generates a lot more sewage waste than an occasional visitor. Without a reasonable plan in place (septic or municipal sewer) that can pose a significant health risk
2. Where's the water coming from? A full time resident needs a reliable, clean source of drinking water
3. Is it safe from environmental factors? Can your residence withstand storms, wind, snow, extreme temperatures?
4. Is it safe from other risk factors? How quickly will it burn down with everyone inside, versus how quickly first responders can get on site (if they can reliably)?
These are important questions because if the government knows you're living there and doesn't enforce all these codes, *they* are liable for what happens. Your safety - and the safety of everyone around you - are absolutely their responsibility.
For number 1 that's definitely the major sanitary issue, should someone choose to live like this we should force incinerator toilets, they're $4000-$5000 and no poop pee anywhere.
Number 2 water is extremely cheap, $3,50 for a 15L jug and another $15 for an electric pump designed for those jugs. Washing up, well gym memberships or friends houses I suppose.
Well water at my camp sucks so I use those jugs and refill them at the municipal water/sewage dumping station. (I have a septic system myself).
With the incinerator toilet+create a kit for a small weeping bed for grey water we could make it plausibly sanitary.
Number 3 well doubt a trailer can withstand a tornado but most else except the cold. There are systems you can buy to strap them to the ground (popular in windy areas in the us).
Number 4 kind of situational, trailers are built out of all sorts of materials, some are similar to a regular house, fire inspectors can check the out, my cousin runs a trailer park and fire inspectors have checked out random trailers eg alarms, extinguishers etc. He pays a lot of property tax for the trailer park, something like 30k-40k/year and there's never been a fire.
I live rural so I've seen all sorts of funky shit, generally people that spend the winter in them will put hay bails wrapped in tarps around the bottom of the trailer ti keep the floor warm and insulate the windows as they're generally single pane.
They're well the average ones aren't great for the winter but you can get 4 season ones now with r22 walls and r30 ceiling/floors which is better but still not amazing.
We should be finding ways to make it work instead of outright banning it.
>Number 2 water is extremely cheap, $3,50 for a 15L jug and another $15 for an electric pump designed for those jugs. Washing up, well gym memberships or friends houses I suppose
That's not acceptable and not reliable. What if your car breaks down, or you're incapacitated by illness or something. Now you've got no source of water in the middle of nowhere.
>With the incinerator toilet+create a kit for a small weeping bed for grey water we could make it plausibly sanitary
How safe is that? Did you do a hydrogeological study? Who's verifying it's just grey water you're dumping into the ground?
You're missing the point: these people are purposely avoiding the system of fire inspectors, building codes, planners, and engineers that are there to have safe homes.
That's why at the bottom that there's ways to make it plausible, just a new kind of inspection/regulatory system, you skipped that part...
This is the approved setup for off grid cottages
I'm not over here giving anyone advice on what is viable locally. Everyone should always look into their local bylaws and determine what is and is not permitted in your local zone/municipality.
Source: I'm a RPP.
I see this think-truism repeated on Reddit ad infinitum, but when you dig deeper into it, the position is based off a grand total of *three* case studies from Strong Towns from smaller to medium sized cities in the US, and people here repeat it like it’s peer-reviewed academic research. As someone who actually studied urban economics in a structured university environment, I’ve yet to see any convincing evidence that suburbs are subsidized or otherwise insolvent.
People on Reddit just love to peddle stuff that aligns with their world view without critically thinking about it. I would really love to know how, for example, a well-off, independent municipality like Oakville or Markham somehow receives subsidies from denser areas in Toronto. I would also love to know how these places are insolvent when their own audited financial statements demonstrate that they are running surpluses even after you remove development fees and include capital depreciation.
Pretty much this. I looked into [the numbers](https://www.reddit.com/r/ottawa/s/Mv2SKucSJp) in Ottawa where I live and the suburbs aren't really as bad as all the internet rhetoric makes it seem. The suburbs might have a few more roads, but the inner city has way more crime, so the question of who is paying for who really isn't so easy. And the wards with higher tax revenue mostly only have higher revenue because of commercial real estate coming from things like office buildings rather than citizens paying residential taxes.
Oh yeah, I forgot about the effect of commercial real estate. Redditors hate the idea of subsidizing suburbanites but are okay with large commercial tenants indirectly subsidizing them!
Exactly. It’s make believe fantasy. There was one study and then Reddit just repeated it over and over because they liked it. Without actually thinking about it.
Roads are just one small portion of a city budget. It’s things like police, fire, and social services that consume the biggest portion of city budgets. And the dense neighbourhoods consume these services far more than suburbs do.
If that were the case we'd expect rural communities to be able to exist independently yet these require a constant inflow of cash from the greater Toronto area to sustain services. I obviously don't think that every community should be high-density but there better be a good reason when they aren't. "Because I want a lawn" doesn't really cut it IMO
I’m still waiting for you to identify exactly which subsidies flow from Toronto to outer suburban areas. You won’t, because you can’t, because they don’t exist.
If anything, places like Oakville and Markham subsidize Toronto to an extent, because they tend to be higher income and contribute more to the provincial and federal coffers than they get back. I think these people earned their well-deserved lawn. Who are you to dictate how they should live?
EDIT: as for rural areas, I’m fine subsidizing rural services because it’s in my interest to not have areas of abject Appalachian poverty on my doorstep.
Well no not in the same way.
Paying something is different than paying nothing.
Sliding taxes are a feature of our system, some times you pay and receive more than you paid. Sometimes less.
But you should always be contributing.
This is Reddit fantasy. The dense inner city areas actually consume more of the tax money because they disproportionally use up police resources, fire, and social services. And these things cost way more than roads.
The majority of city budgets in Canada are staff salaries, mostly police, fire, social services. Road construction is only a small minority portion.
Overall, it’s actually the suburbs that fund the inner city neighbourhoods.
Yeah if you do stupid accounting to use this terrible math that everyone always runs around with on Reddit and YouTube. Suburbs are specialty residential districts, of course their taxes are not going to look as nice as if you have a mixed use district. But that's because you're comparing apples to oranges. If you actually track all the taxes paid by the residents of those suburbs, You actually get an Apple to apples comparison but it's difficult to do so that's what we don't have the data on it.
Basically it's like If you have a factory and then you have an apartment building where The factories workers live, to use a simple example. If you just look at the apartment building it looks like it's losing money, and the factory looks like it's making tons of money In terms of taxes. But the factory only exists because it has access to the workers. So then you have to look at the factory and the apartment as one. With more mixed use zoning you get that together, But then when they're more segregated people just look at the residential and make ridiculous claims. Track every single one of the suburban workers consumption and production back to them and apply that to the neighborhood and you'll see why it's a ridiculous argument.
And then the second point of contention is with density. Yes of course if you stack people on top of each other it's more efficient I don't think That is arguable. But that's also a silly comparison unless you adjust it based on living standards. That's more efficient but people have lower standard of living because they have less square feet per capita of both housing and land. There's a lot of negative externalities that are not priced The people making your argument never consider, such a sound traffic levels etc. I can tell you there's a huge benefit just from being somewhere that doesn't get outside for traffic and I never see that considered by people making your argument as a real benefit.
Suburbia is more expensive because it's a better standard of living, and if you correctly track it's not exactly being subsidized it's just obviously not as efficient. You also just can't talk about just one type of suburbia like it's a monolith. There are definitely places that take it to a ridiculous level in the US that are obviously not efficient but that doesn't represent all of suburbia at all. I know here we have like twice as many houses per acre as those terrible projects in the US and there's decent walkable businesses like a daycare, convenience store, restaurants and bakeries. It's most definitely still suburbia but It's a great way to do things.
It's also not particularly helpful to just shoehorn your pet issue into a conversation that's not relevant which is my main point.
People: I can’t afford to live in a house because there are so many people. I live in a trailer park.
Government: we brought so many people here that we just found out the trailer parks can’t take more low income people struggling to find a home. Obviously the trailer park is the problem.
> People: I just don't want to be homeless and have a resemblance of a semi normal life.
> Government: ~~Fuck you, you will live in squalor~~ Ok, but part of that 'semi-normal life' includes the same social obligations as everybody else, like paying for shared services, not trashing the place, and so on. You don't just get to 'check out' of society and expect everybody else to pick up the slack.
> People: FUCK YOU FASCIST PIGS
Step down how?
It's not up to other tax payers of a small town to pay for free loaders.
Municipalities aren't allowed to run deficits. And when your population is small, you don't have the tax base of a city the size of Toronto has.
This being said, there's other ways to fund things. Changing the funding model could solve the problem. Certain services within the municipal boundaries like police services could have a flat rate associated with each parcel that isn't determined by property value, that way it wouldn't matter if anything was built on the land or not.
I live in a small town and garbage collection was switched to a user pay system. We buy regional garbage tags that we put on each bag of garbage. Each bag of garbage costs 3$.
But recycling still doesn't cost anything.
The town has resident IDs for services like the community center, library etc. If you're not a resident you pay a higher cost if you use those services. Only residents with a legal address in town get the discounted rates.
If more towns detached service costs from property taxes, there would be less reason to need ever increasing property values to fund things.
My generation is doing a good job solving the housing crisis by not having kids, eventually there would be more houses than people as the population decreases.
And yet the gov't found a way to screw us over and prevent that from happening. Well done gov't!
Same. Yeah, I thought I saw the writing on the wall a decade ago. I thought as the boomers generation started to decline I'd be able to swoop in and finally buy a home and then COVID hit and capitalism took over. Now I don't want to raise children because I don't trust the government to have young Canadians best interest in mind.
We are just buying our first home at 37 and I'm not sure how I'm going to figure out my mortgage and bills let alone juggling children.
I'm in a rent controlled apartment. I just might die in it lol.
Buying a house? By the time I have $750k saved, I can retire overseas cuz no kids to keep me here.
This is not housing. You obviously don't live in Northern Ontario. These are recreational places people are setting up to camp and making it semi permanent.
It would have probably helped not having record population growth, Canada was in a very unique situation of only sharing one border to a wealthier country.. we created an artificial supply/ demand scenario in one of the lowest population dense nations in the world
Maybe, but the affordability problem has been going on for a very long time and just blaming immigrants is a great way to not actually fix the causes. Also as we can see the trend is global, so it can't entirely be from immigration.
Mass migration globally was warned about for decades, as our global population becomes more unsustainable and our resources spread thinner there will simply not be enough for everyone, leading to increased cost of living and poverty as demand rises.
The conversation should include both global and regional sustainable populations and whether certain areas are outpacing themselves. This should happen sooner rather than later..
We produce more goods and services than we ever have by A LOT. There is no resource shortage, this is just doomerism. If you concern is population booms then you would want more people to be in developed nations instead of developing nations since that is the environment that lowers fertility like in Canada. Not to mention a robust system of birth control since women are hte ones deciding to have less kids. If you believe this then you should be pressing for more migration, not less.
OK, that doesn't explain why this is a global phenomenon, nor does it explain why housing inaffordability has been an issue for over 15 years (arguably longer). I'm not doubting that population has an impact, but surely you aren't arguing that it is the only issue. It might not even be the leading cause.
This is a municipal government, not feds or provincial.
I don't see why land with a house already on it should pay for a trailer since they already pay property taxes.
But there's people on here that complain about the costs of roads etc for single family home neighborhoods and say density is what's needed.
But putting a trailer on a vacant lot doesn't mean you get to use all the services for free while somebody who owns a home a couple blocks away has to pay.
It was such a mild winter in Northern Ontario that it is going to be a huge fire risk this summer. I'd rather not have a bunch of people camped out illegally, increasing the risk of starting forest fires. The housing crisis isn't going to get any better if my entire town burns down because of people who want to avoid laws.
Yeah, we've had numerous fires around town and a very large portion have been due to "camps" where somebody either had a sparking fire in a dry grassy area, or used some sort of device with open flame inside a tent.
Harder to tell about the stuff out on the rural roads because - other than a collection of trash that might not have burned - they'll usually GTFO once something sparks and it takes awhile to get noticed, but I wouldn't be surprised if it's a similar situation.
Now add a bit of propane and some falling-apart campers to the mix and... nah I'm sure it'll be fine.
I think you misunderstand what northern Ontario is like. This isn't about junkies and encampments. It's probably about campers overstaying at the boat launch all season long
People don't want social supports to prevent that and people actively support worse outcomes like people stealing to survive because of it.
Stuff like drugs are also made to have worse outcomes when it's criminalized and organized crime can profit off of it.
Ofc there's always going to be people wanting to live off the grid but the scale of it is much different these days
Yup exactly but there needs to be places for people to go. Most social services are underfunded and governments have been under cyberattacks which means our infrastructure is crumbling when we most need it.
Yes, that's what happens when you mismanaged the country and cause poverty. Crime increases.
Go ahead, criminalize being poor. Spend more on them in jail than actually helping them.
It's not just addicts and junkies, housing affordability is a crisis that affects many Canadians, employed or not, and should be be considered on a Municipal, provincial and federal level.
"You're not paying for fire protection, you're not paying for policing, you're not paying for roads."
ok, it's a deal, now leave them alone and let them stay
Agreed. Raising taxes and imposing reasonable environmental regulations (like sewage disposal) is fine. Evicting people from their own properties because they can't afford to build a house is not.
It’s creepy how it’s written into every bylaw, and the ironic part is that you can’t live full time in a RV because the electrical doesn’t meet the same standards as for a house, but, they are CSA certified for a RV…… now, the other funny thing is that you CAN live full time in a RV park…..
The only logical reason is because it stagnates the ever increasing assessments of municipalities and tax revenue generated by “homes” which require a mortgage. The other side of things is also affordability of getting a mobile home, yet, you have to adhere to certain standards of the “land” you don’t own.
It’s a money thing at the end of the day, as per usual.
Want to crowd fund or group cam on your own land, nupe, can’t do that. Need RV zoning which means you have to implement power, water, sewer / septic and have enough land to meet that criteria.
Debt keeps the wheels of the system greased.
Where I live there is a trailer encampment down by the ocean and people get upset that these people are “camping on luxury views.”
Nope, just a fed beach with no camping by laws and they gotta live.
I can't just build a shack on some land and live in it anymore, wtf is this?
You don't own the land. Of course you can't just go to a random piece of land and put a trailer on it. The same way we can't go and squat on a piece of land or build a house in the middle of a national park.
Illegal trailer parks spend virtually all of their disposable income locally. Whomever is bitching had likely been assessed extra taxes and cannot bear the burden if not equally distributed among the poorest. Funny how hypocrisy is so ingrained in the peasants they will vote against their own interests
An alternative is that you could read the article, pay $400 annually, then still be able to live in the woods and just survive on tanks of water and storing waste.
Also where do you live that you pay over $12000 a year in property tax?
My biggest dream to owning a home involves driving a mobile home into some plot of woods and just surviving on tanks of water and storing waste
It's kind of disheartening knowing the government won't let you get away with even just survival. You MUST pay 1 million + and thousands in property taxes for the right to a home.
This post appears to relate to a province/territory of Canada. As a reminder of the rules of this subreddit, we do not permit negative commentary about all residents of any province, city, or other geography - this is an example of prejudice, and prejudice is not permitted here. https://www.reddit.com/r/canada/wiki/rules Cette soumission semble concerner une province ou un territoire du Canada. Selon les règles de ce sous-répertoire, nous n'autorisons pas les commentaires négatifs sur tous les résidents d'une province, d'une ville ou d'une autre région géographique; il s'agit d'un exemple de intolérance qui n'est pas autorisé ici. https://www.reddit.com/r/canada/wiki/regles *I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please [contact the moderators of this subreddit](/message/compose/?to=/r/canada) if you have any questions or concerns.*
I feel like everyone is reading this wrong. This probably isn't about people living in campers, it's about seasonal camp sites. In northwestern Ontario and I assume north eastern, its extremely common to have 10-20 campers set up at every lake and boat launch from may long to labour day
yeah this thread has a lot of kneejerk reactions...
There's absolutely bots that just have scripts to fill into anything, I've really noticed this here
Reddit is over run by AI bots
Nah you have just been noticing the average intelligence of Canadians.
Hi northwestern Ontario
Lots of those are also on crown land; which is legal you just got to move every few weeks. But a lot of northerners are fiercly protective of their crownloand "campsite" during summer and hunting seasons.
That doesn't change the fact that they're drawing on municipally provided services, and not contributing.
I agree. but my comment is referring to all the talk about poverty and the housing crisis when this bylaw seems to be entirely about unofficial seasonal camp sites
How would bylaw even know? How would they enter someone's property? And how do they know it is being used, can't someone claim that they just parked it without using it? This seems like draconian state over reach. Aside from collecting trash what services are they using that these municipalites are providing. Which doesn't even make sense, isn't garbage pickup limited to a certain amount? I just do not get any of this. If I owned a property up in some rural area and decided to invite 1000 people to camp out for a week and enjoy some music what does the municipality have to do with it? Assuming I clean up and don't charge entry, what business is it of theirs who I invite to my weeklong party? And if they came in a trailer but took the wheels off does that still make it a trailer? Or a tent? So many questions and annoyances at this.
Bylaw enforcement officers can enter someone's property to enforce bylaws. As the mayor explained in the article, they use city resources (fire, police, ambulance, roads) so should pay their fair share.
Okay. So if I were hosting a very large party every weekend as per my example above would I not be using up much bigger resources?
Depends. Will a significant percentage of your town's vacant lots be hosting the same kind of crowd at the same time? If not, it won't much matter, but if so, sure, every noticeable increase in expenditures ought to trigger a corresponding user fee, in order for the vacant lot party animals to not piggy-bank on regular taxpayers in a significant way.
I understand your logic but making the point rhetorically. What is the point of owning land if for every time you wish to do something you need permission and to pay a fee?
I read that - but is this not what the land taxes are for? Why not raise those which is the way other forms of land users pay into those services? Why make it something special?
That's what property taxes are for, yes. But rates for vacant land are very low, which is fair because it is, well, vacant, and hence owners don't use the above resources. Since the property ceases to be vacant when someone plops a number of trailers on it, an adjustment is necessary to ensure taxation is fair to all the taxpayers. It probably doesn't much matter when your town is large (tax base is large) and the number of such trailers is fairly low, but obviously in the town they talk about in the article it started to become a financial burden.
Fuckin' Lahey. Nobody payin lot fees up in this ma'fucka. And tell Barb her scalloped potatoes are *FUCKED*.
Frig off Bærb
Haha that’s exactly how Randy says it. Nice
Even un-skinny bops rockin a gutxedo
Your scalloped potatoes are fucked
You should be able to get double votes I heard that
as soon as me and T get power and water up in this Ma, then this van is going to fall under the same jurisdiction of every other trailer up in this Ma! hold on! Randy it's the fashion police, you're being charged 500 bucks for wearing dem pants after labor day lol 😂
Everyone defending this has clearly never seen these encampments first hand. It doesn't take long before it's completely littered with trash then abandoned and done elsewhere. It's ridiculous. They absolutely need to be held accountable and pay for the services listed like the rest of us. Us being in housing crisis is no excuse, because we are ALL in a housing crisis. You don't just get to stop paying for waste disposal and dump your trash wherever you please. F**K THAT!
I think the people living in trailers are more so in a housing crisis than those in houses. There are varying degrees of housing crisis here.
Good point. Never saw it that way before.
There was one guy who did this at a boat launch.... it was great. Single guy, kept it clean. Always had a presence there all summer long and kept the cars safe. Cars were left for days as people went to cabins. He was ordered to leave. Two years later vandals slashed almost every tire and broke in every car. Not saying it wouldn't have happened with him there, but still
Reads like the birth of an evil villain story. /s
> Everyone defending this has clearly never seen these encampments first hand. It doesn't take long before it's completely littered with trash then abandoned and done elsewhere. Many people north of the GTA saw what the Torontians did to the communities during COVID. So many loud mfs trampling waterways to have their gaggle of kids run around while they have a BBQ in a protected greenspace. Fuck Toronto people.
And where do they go when they can't afford those services?
Prison.
MAID. /S
[удалено]
>To work? Not sure which country you're from but here in Canada the median salary is 41k and the median posted rent is 26k. Working class people can't afford alternatives.
What about Northern Ontario
Northern ontario median salary is 25k. Median rent is a two-fer, a pound of moose jerky and a carton of Indian smokes
Between people on ODSP and those struggling with mental health issues, I bet one in ten would be find to return to society. If they could afford it.
Why work when you can collect free money
I knew an old MNR guy, when he saw a hunt/fish camp he'd make notes about the plates, get their names and addresses when he was checking their licenses, and he would let them know that he'd be back by after they left to check that they left if clean, and he would. But yeah some of the shit you find in the middle of nowhere, I swear you can be camping far out of range of cell towers and roads and still find mystery dumps of shit you can't imagine anyone humping in there to begin with.
Yes the garbage is the most visible problem. But if they all pitched in and paid for a dumpster hauled each week to a landfill- what else would they need. Do they have electricity, sewer and water?
If they were the types to pay for those services they'd live in actual trailer parks and not rest stops and other illegal areas. You're missing the point on just what kind of people these folks are.
Are there enough legitimate trailer parks though? That are open all year and not just in summer?
Yes. This is what happened in HRM. The trailers had no where to go and they managed to keep water and electricity, garbage disposal open through this winter. Not sure if it will be permanent or not. But it apparently kept quite a few people out of tents. AND in a prime location as well.
Best I can do is tell them m to move along and a token tiny home village that cost more than a regular house.
People: I just don't want to be homeless and have a resemblance of a semi normal life. Government: Fuck you, you will live in squalor
There is nothing wrong with living on land you own on a trailer. Also, I don't think it is unreasonable for people to pay for the services they are using. Bare land is often taxed in a different way than land with a dwelling on it. Those living on land without a dwelling are potentially forging paying for the services they use, like policing, fire, etc. The services they consume without payment will just need to be covered by other taxpayers. A $400 a year permit seems very reasonable to address the imbalance between funding and service use.
>Bare land is often taxed in a different way than land with a dwelling on it. I grew up near a campground like this. The seasonal campers are basically cottages. Most have power, TV & Internet, and some even have decks & little gardens. But they still have wheels, so despite obviously being parked there permanently (all year), they aren't technically buildings for tax purposes. It's both hilarious and a bit fucked.
>There is nothing wrong with living on land you own on a trailer. When it becomes a permanent dwelling there are issues that need to be addressed for the safety of the occupants and neighbours 1. Where does the poop go? A permanent resident (or multiple residents) generates a lot more sewage waste than an occasional visitor. Without a reasonable plan in place (septic or municipal sewer) that can pose a significant health risk 2. Where's the water coming from? A full time resident needs a reliable, clean source of drinking water 3. Is it safe from environmental factors? Can your residence withstand storms, wind, snow, extreme temperatures? 4. Is it safe from other risk factors? How quickly will it burn down with everyone inside, versus how quickly first responders can get on site (if they can reliably)? These are important questions because if the government knows you're living there and doesn't enforce all these codes, *they* are liable for what happens. Your safety - and the safety of everyone around you - are absolutely their responsibility.
To answer #1, I’ve heard of them discharging their tanks directly onto the ground, to the delight of their neighbours and the ministry of environment.
For number 1 that's definitely the major sanitary issue, should someone choose to live like this we should force incinerator toilets, they're $4000-$5000 and no poop pee anywhere. Number 2 water is extremely cheap, $3,50 for a 15L jug and another $15 for an electric pump designed for those jugs. Washing up, well gym memberships or friends houses I suppose. Well water at my camp sucks so I use those jugs and refill them at the municipal water/sewage dumping station. (I have a septic system myself). With the incinerator toilet+create a kit for a small weeping bed for grey water we could make it plausibly sanitary. Number 3 well doubt a trailer can withstand a tornado but most else except the cold. There are systems you can buy to strap them to the ground (popular in windy areas in the us). Number 4 kind of situational, trailers are built out of all sorts of materials, some are similar to a regular house, fire inspectors can check the out, my cousin runs a trailer park and fire inspectors have checked out random trailers eg alarms, extinguishers etc. He pays a lot of property tax for the trailer park, something like 30k-40k/year and there's never been a fire. I live rural so I've seen all sorts of funky shit, generally people that spend the winter in them will put hay bails wrapped in tarps around the bottom of the trailer ti keep the floor warm and insulate the windows as they're generally single pane. They're well the average ones aren't great for the winter but you can get 4 season ones now with r22 walls and r30 ceiling/floors which is better but still not amazing. We should be finding ways to make it work instead of outright banning it.
>Number 2 water is extremely cheap, $3,50 for a 15L jug and another $15 for an electric pump designed for those jugs. Washing up, well gym memberships or friends houses I suppose That's not acceptable and not reliable. What if your car breaks down, or you're incapacitated by illness or something. Now you've got no source of water in the middle of nowhere. >With the incinerator toilet+create a kit for a small weeping bed for grey water we could make it plausibly sanitary How safe is that? Did you do a hydrogeological study? Who's verifying it's just grey water you're dumping into the ground? You're missing the point: these people are purposely avoiding the system of fire inspectors, building codes, planners, and engineers that are there to have safe homes.
That's why at the bottom that there's ways to make it plausible, just a new kind of inspection/regulatory system, you skipped that part... This is the approved setup for off grid cottages
Yes, for sure these and others are valid considerations. It isn't a free for all.
It’s actually illegal to live in a trailer full time on your own land.
Yes, but it shouldn't be.
and here we have the problem.
It depends on the municipality.
Yes but the overwhelming majority of municipalities do not allow this, so I’d say it’s ill informed to be telling people this is a viable option.
I'm not over here giving anyone advice on what is viable locally. Everyone should always look into their local bylaws and determine what is and is not permitted in your local zone/municipality. Source: I'm a RPP.
Now do suburbia lol
Nothing he said there applies to suburbia.
Suburbs are subsidized by taxes from more dense areas of cities in the same way these trailer parks are
I see this think-truism repeated on Reddit ad infinitum, but when you dig deeper into it, the position is based off a grand total of *three* case studies from Strong Towns from smaller to medium sized cities in the US, and people here repeat it like it’s peer-reviewed academic research. As someone who actually studied urban economics in a structured university environment, I’ve yet to see any convincing evidence that suburbs are subsidized or otherwise insolvent. People on Reddit just love to peddle stuff that aligns with their world view without critically thinking about it. I would really love to know how, for example, a well-off, independent municipality like Oakville or Markham somehow receives subsidies from denser areas in Toronto. I would also love to know how these places are insolvent when their own audited financial statements demonstrate that they are running surpluses even after you remove development fees and include capital depreciation.
Pretty much this. I looked into [the numbers](https://www.reddit.com/r/ottawa/s/Mv2SKucSJp) in Ottawa where I live and the suburbs aren't really as bad as all the internet rhetoric makes it seem. The suburbs might have a few more roads, but the inner city has way more crime, so the question of who is paying for who really isn't so easy. And the wards with higher tax revenue mostly only have higher revenue because of commercial real estate coming from things like office buildings rather than citizens paying residential taxes.
Oh yeah, I forgot about the effect of commercial real estate. Redditors hate the idea of subsidizing suburbanites but are okay with large commercial tenants indirectly subsidizing them!
Exactly. It’s make believe fantasy. There was one study and then Reddit just repeated it over and over because they liked it. Without actually thinking about it. Roads are just one small portion of a city budget. It’s things like police, fire, and social services that consume the biggest portion of city budgets. And the dense neighbourhoods consume these services far more than suburbs do.
If that were the case we'd expect rural communities to be able to exist independently yet these require a constant inflow of cash from the greater Toronto area to sustain services. I obviously don't think that every community should be high-density but there better be a good reason when they aren't. "Because I want a lawn" doesn't really cut it IMO
I’m still waiting for you to identify exactly which subsidies flow from Toronto to outer suburban areas. You won’t, because you can’t, because they don’t exist. If anything, places like Oakville and Markham subsidize Toronto to an extent, because they tend to be higher income and contribute more to the provincial and federal coffers than they get back. I think these people earned their well-deserved lawn. Who are you to dictate how they should live? EDIT: as for rural areas, I’m fine subsidizing rural services because it’s in my interest to not have areas of abject Appalachian poverty on my doorstep.
Well no not in the same way. Paying something is different than paying nothing. Sliding taxes are a feature of our system, some times you pay and receive more than you paid. Sometimes less. But you should always be contributing.
This is Reddit fantasy. The dense inner city areas actually consume more of the tax money because they disproportionally use up police resources, fire, and social services. And these things cost way more than roads. The majority of city budgets in Canada are staff salaries, mostly police, fire, social services. Road construction is only a small minority portion. Overall, it’s actually the suburbs that fund the inner city neighbourhoods.
Yeah if you do stupid accounting to use this terrible math that everyone always runs around with on Reddit and YouTube. Suburbs are specialty residential districts, of course their taxes are not going to look as nice as if you have a mixed use district. But that's because you're comparing apples to oranges. If you actually track all the taxes paid by the residents of those suburbs, You actually get an Apple to apples comparison but it's difficult to do so that's what we don't have the data on it. Basically it's like If you have a factory and then you have an apartment building where The factories workers live, to use a simple example. If you just look at the apartment building it looks like it's losing money, and the factory looks like it's making tons of money In terms of taxes. But the factory only exists because it has access to the workers. So then you have to look at the factory and the apartment as one. With more mixed use zoning you get that together, But then when they're more segregated people just look at the residential and make ridiculous claims. Track every single one of the suburban workers consumption and production back to them and apply that to the neighborhood and you'll see why it's a ridiculous argument. And then the second point of contention is with density. Yes of course if you stack people on top of each other it's more efficient I don't think That is arguable. But that's also a silly comparison unless you adjust it based on living standards. That's more efficient but people have lower standard of living because they have less square feet per capita of both housing and land. There's a lot of negative externalities that are not priced The people making your argument never consider, such a sound traffic levels etc. I can tell you there's a huge benefit just from being somewhere that doesn't get outside for traffic and I never see that considered by people making your argument as a real benefit. Suburbia is more expensive because it's a better standard of living, and if you correctly track it's not exactly being subsidized it's just obviously not as efficient. You also just can't talk about just one type of suburbia like it's a monolith. There are definitely places that take it to a ridiculous level in the US that are obviously not efficient but that doesn't represent all of suburbia at all. I know here we have like twice as many houses per acre as those terrible projects in the US and there's decent walkable businesses like a daycare, convenience store, restaurants and bakeries. It's most definitely still suburbia but It's a great way to do things. It's also not particularly helpful to just shoehorn your pet issue into a conversation that's not relevant which is my main point.
Yeah, that's a whole other can of worms.
Well Olivia chow would take issue, it's hard to measure taxable rainwater on a lot
Tell me you know nothing about rainwater tax without telling me you know nothing
People: I just don't want to be homeless and have a resemblance of a semi normal life. Government: Best I can do is dental care and assisted suicide
Both of those things are fine. Let's bash the government for doing a shit job but let's not bash the few good things they have done
People: I can’t afford to live in a house because there are so many people. I live in a trailer park. Government: we brought so many people here that we just found out the trailer parks can’t take more low income people struggling to find a home. Obviously the trailer park is the problem.
Government: don't worry if you feel depressed we can help you end your life!
Government: its gotta be really bad to get MAID but don’t worry, we’ll help you feel really bad too.
I was talking about both dental and assisted suicide are fine the amount of people coming is not
Hello Jim! I agree! My point wasn’t counter point.
Yes I was just clarifying for myself
sip fall vase enter liquid vegetable lunchroom sheet whole weather *This post was mass deleted and anonymized with [Redact](https://redact.dev)*
Poeple : I don't understand municipal jurisdiction but I will blame big gov.
All while screaming "we don't want big government to have so much power because YouTube said something about 'freedoms' and I belive what I'm told"
Get to a big city and get in a tent!
> People: I just don't want to be homeless and have a resemblance of a semi normal life. > Government: ~~Fuck you, you will live in squalor~~ Ok, but part of that 'semi-normal life' includes the same social obligations as everybody else, like paying for shared services, not trashing the place, and so on. You don't just get to 'check out' of society and expect everybody else to pick up the slack. > People: FUCK YOU FASCIST PIGS
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This is a rural municipality, not the feds or the provinces.
Fair enough, you're right. That said though, it's still pretty rancid.
Well, if either stood up, the local municipality would step down. Fuck all those people involved.
Step down how? It's not up to other tax payers of a small town to pay for free loaders. Municipalities aren't allowed to run deficits. And when your population is small, you don't have the tax base of a city the size of Toronto has. This being said, there's other ways to fund things. Changing the funding model could solve the problem. Certain services within the municipal boundaries like police services could have a flat rate associated with each parcel that isn't determined by property value, that way it wouldn't matter if anything was built on the land or not. I live in a small town and garbage collection was switched to a user pay system. We buy regional garbage tags that we put on each bag of garbage. Each bag of garbage costs 3$. But recycling still doesn't cost anything. The town has resident IDs for services like the community center, library etc. If you're not a resident you pay a higher cost if you use those services. Only residents with a legal address in town get the discounted rates. If more towns detached service costs from property taxes, there would be less reason to need ever increasing property values to fund things.
Hey governments! There is a fucking housing crisis going on that YOU are Mainly responsible for. So Fuck Right Off!!!
Be mad at the municipality for this one this isn't any other government
My generation is doing a good job solving the housing crisis by not having kids, eventually there would be more houses than people as the population decreases. And yet the gov't found a way to screw us over and prevent that from happening. Well done gov't!
Don’t worry the gov has a plan for that, mass immigration…
Literally the only thing they actually have a plan for apparently.
Same. Yeah, I thought I saw the writing on the wall a decade ago. I thought as the boomers generation started to decline I'd be able to swoop in and finally buy a home and then COVID hit and capitalism took over. Now I don't want to raise children because I don't trust the government to have young Canadians best interest in mind. We are just buying our first home at 37 and I'm not sure how I'm going to figure out my mortgage and bills let alone juggling children.
I'm in a rent controlled apartment. I just might die in it lol. Buying a house? By the time I have $750k saved, I can retire overseas cuz no kids to keep me here.
I got my 350 "apartment" just before rent went insane. Same unit is 1300 now. So yeah I'm here forever
This is not housing. You obviously don't live in Northern Ontario. These are recreational places people are setting up to camp and making it semi permanent.
> There is a fucking housing crisis going on that YOU are Mainly responsible for. > > It's the town not fed or the province
Its a global crisis of affordable housing. Blaming just 'the government' seems to let off many of the other culprits in the crisis.
It would have probably helped not having record population growth, Canada was in a very unique situation of only sharing one border to a wealthier country.. we created an artificial supply/ demand scenario in one of the lowest population dense nations in the world
Maybe, but the affordability problem has been going on for a very long time and just blaming immigrants is a great way to not actually fix the causes. Also as we can see the trend is global, so it can't entirely be from immigration.
Mass migration globally was warned about for decades, as our global population becomes more unsustainable and our resources spread thinner there will simply not be enough for everyone, leading to increased cost of living and poverty as demand rises. The conversation should include both global and regional sustainable populations and whether certain areas are outpacing themselves. This should happen sooner rather than later..
We produce more goods and services than we ever have by A LOT. There is no resource shortage, this is just doomerism. If you concern is population booms then you would want more people to be in developed nations instead of developing nations since that is the environment that lowers fertility like in Canada. Not to mention a robust system of birth control since women are hte ones deciding to have less kids. If you believe this then you should be pressing for more migration, not less.
The crisis here was highly amplified by our Government, our population growth in the last few years makes no sense.
OK, that doesn't explain why this is a global phenomenon, nor does it explain why housing inaffordability has been an issue for over 15 years (arguably longer). I'm not doubting that population has an impact, but surely you aren't arguing that it is the only issue. It might not even be the leading cause.
The crisis is worse in Canada compared to other developed nations.
By what metric?
Ya Like Dags?
This is a municipal government, not feds or provincial. I don't see why land with a house already on it should pay for a trailer since they already pay property taxes. But there's people on here that complain about the costs of roads etc for single family home neighborhoods and say density is what's needed. But putting a trailer on a vacant lot doesn't mean you get to use all the services for free while somebody who owns a home a couple blocks away has to pay.
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It was such a mild winter in Northern Ontario that it is going to be a huge fire risk this summer. I'd rather not have a bunch of people camped out illegally, increasing the risk of starting forest fires. The housing crisis isn't going to get any better if my entire town burns down because of people who want to avoid laws.
Yeah, we've had numerous fires around town and a very large portion have been due to "camps" where somebody either had a sparking fire in a dry grassy area, or used some sort of device with open flame inside a tent. Harder to tell about the stuff out on the rural roads because - other than a collection of trash that might not have burned - they'll usually GTFO once something sparks and it takes awhile to get noticed, but I wouldn't be surprised if it's a similar situation. Now add a bit of propane and some falling-apart campers to the mix and... nah I'm sure it'll be fine.
I think you misunderstand what northern Ontario is like. This isn't about junkies and encampments. It's probably about campers overstaying at the boat launch all season long
People don't want social supports to prevent that and people actively support worse outcomes like people stealing to survive because of it. Stuff like drugs are also made to have worse outcomes when it's criminalized and organized crime can profit off of it. Ofc there's always going to be people wanting to live off the grid but the scale of it is much different these days
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Yup exactly but there needs to be places for people to go. Most social services are underfunded and governments have been under cyberattacks which means our infrastructure is crumbling when we most need it.
Yes, that's what happens when you mismanaged the country and cause poverty. Crime increases. Go ahead, criminalize being poor. Spend more on them in jail than actually helping them.
It's not just addicts and junkies, housing affordability is a crisis that affects many Canadians, employed or not, and should be be considered on a Municipal, provincial and federal level.
"You're not paying for fire protection, you're not paying for policing, you're not paying for roads." ok, it's a deal, now leave them alone and let them stay
Agreed. Raising taxes and imposing reasonable environmental regulations (like sewage disposal) is fine. Evicting people from their own properties because they can't afford to build a house is not.
It’s creepy how it’s written into every bylaw, and the ironic part is that you can’t live full time in a RV because the electrical doesn’t meet the same standards as for a house, but, they are CSA certified for a RV…… now, the other funny thing is that you CAN live full time in a RV park….. The only logical reason is because it stagnates the ever increasing assessments of municipalities and tax revenue generated by “homes” which require a mortgage. The other side of things is also affordability of getting a mobile home, yet, you have to adhere to certain standards of the “land” you don’t own. It’s a money thing at the end of the day, as per usual. Want to crowd fund or group cam on your own land, nupe, can’t do that. Need RV zoning which means you have to implement power, water, sewer / septic and have enough land to meet that criteria. Debt keeps the wheels of the system greased.
I don’t think people are being evicted tho.
Ok so let’s make legal. We do need more trailer parking.
This seems fair, forget about the billionaires and corporations laundering money and evading taxes, how about those people trying to just survive?
Where I live there is a trailer encampment down by the ocean and people get upset that these people are “camping on luxury views.” Nope, just a fed beach with no camping by laws and they gotta live.
As long as they don’t make a mess of the place and dump sewage in the ocean, I don’t see the problem.
Me neither! We pump sewage into the ocean at a city scale just down the road so….
Time for tent communities to start paying taxes too I guess.
Imagine if they could afford a house instead.
cant even put a trailer in some grass and live in it anymore, wtf is this?
I can't just build a shack on some land and live in it anymore, wtf is this? You don't own the land. Of course you can't just go to a random piece of land and put a trailer on it. The same way we can't go and squat on a piece of land or build a house in the middle of a national park.
Set up actual sites and start charging; but atleast provide hookups if you're going to do that?
Or just make housing affordable so people will not resort to such measures 🤷♂️
Illegal trailer parks spend virtually all of their disposable income locally. Whomever is bitching had likely been assessed extra taxes and cannot bear the burden if not equally distributed among the poorest. Funny how hypocrisy is so ingrained in the peasants they will vote against their own interests
Tax grab. Plain and simple
They are now applying "fair share" logic to trailer home dwellers. Dark times indeed.
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An alternative is that you could read the article, pay $400 annually, then still be able to live in the woods and just survive on tanks of water and storing waste. Also where do you live that you pay over $12000 a year in property tax?
Govern me harder daddy!
My biggest dream to owning a home involves driving a mobile home into some plot of woods and just surviving on tanks of water and storing waste It's kind of disheartening knowing the government won't let you get away with even just survival. You MUST pay 1 million + and thousands in property taxes for the right to a home.
Study after study has shown that poor people pay more than their fair share.
That would depend on how you define fair.