Recent reporting on affordable housing issues on Gabriola Island reveal the challenges Vancouver Island and Islands Trust residents are facing with the Regional District of Nanaimo's prohibitive stance on innovative/adaptive and eco-conscious housing options (self-built tiny homes, cob homes, recreational vehicles, and other small footprint and low resource use housing modalities) in the housing crisis.
On October 23, 2025 Gabriola Sounder reporter Hope Lompe reported on RDN enforcement actions against eco-housing on Gabriola Island. The owners of the homes in question refute the regional district's characterization of their housing as unsafe:
"This assessment and timeline is misleading, write Boehm, Rush, and Apostolopoulos. They say their homes are safe, have had professional oversight, and should be allowed as legal non-confirming homes under Gabriola Island’s non-enforcement policy on non-confirming dwellings that do not pose a health and safety risk.
“The property in question with the lawyer’s letter is 750 South Road. The first visit from the RDN occurred in May 2024, not 2020. Suggesting that enforcement has been ongoing since 2020 is misleading. We have made meaningful progress. We engaged a draftsperson, worked with architects, began site plans, and initiated conversations with a structural engineer,” they write.
They add every home on the property was built with professional input including ticketed carpenters, experienced concrete workers, and consultation with an engineer.
“The RDN has not conducted a meaningful on-site assessment of these structures. They have not inspected the homes or reviewed engineering documentation, yet they continue to label them unsafe. The property has three engineered and permitted septic systems. If RDN staff had taken the time to ask, they would know that. Instead, they arrived with binders and Do Not Occupy notices, not with curiosity or collaboration,” they write.
“We also have a structural engineer willing to work with us on the cob house, but as of today the RDN has not responded to our requests for a meeting.”"
Housing is a human right. You can help guide the Regional District of Nanaimo and other local governance bodies in BC towards a more forward-thinking and adaptive approach to this unprecedented housing crisis by encouraging them to honour and support the necessary and innovative housing solutions that communities are generating on our own to address the housing crisis that market housing, developers, and outdated and slow-moving bureaucratic systems have failed to address since the Federal Government of Canada 'got out of the business of social housing' in 1993.
Our local governments have an opportunity to learn from the passionate, dedicated, innovative, environmentally conscious, safe, and budget-conscious work that communities are doing on the ground, with limited resources, to create housing for the crisis that markets and governments manufactured through short-sighted thinking and policy 30 years ago.
Please feel free to write to Regional District of Nanaimo representatives and tell them 'hands off our futures! legalize adaptive and compassionate eco-housing options now!'.
You can contact the RDN Board and staff at the following e-mail addresses:
vanessa.craig@rdn.bc.ca; stuart.mclean@rdn.bc.ca; jessica.stanley@rdn.bc.ca; lauren.melanson@rdn.bc.ca; bob.rogers@rdn.bc.ca; leanne.salter@rdn.bc.ca; lehann.wallace@rdn.bc.ca; leonard.krog@nanaimo.ca; tyler.brown@nanaimo.ca; ben.geselbracht@nanaimo.ca; erin.hemmens@nanaimo.ca; janice.perrino@nanaimo.ca; paul.manly@nanaimo.ca; ian.thorpe@nanaimo.ca; mayor@parksville.ca; councillorwood@parksville.ca; mayor.swain@lantzville.ca; mayor@qualicumbeach.com
Relevant RDN staff to include:
GKeller@rdn.bc.ca; pthompson@rdn.bc.ca; planning@rdn.bc.ca
Housing is a human right! Let's ensure nobody is left fighting for housing due to outdated bureaucratic approaches that have failed to keep up with eco-housing innovations in the last 30 years when we have the resources to adapt and co-create futures that ensure affordable, safe, and eco-conscious housing for all.
-- Oceanside Affordable Housing