Grant Higginson for City Council, Ward 4 St. Patrick's

Housing and revitalization

Reusing what we have is how we build new. Measure success in new homes and open storefronts.

Last updated: September 3, 2026

Hand-drawn illustration of a St. Catharines residential street with the Niagara Escarpment behind it.

The problem

People sometimes ask whether St. Catharines should build new homes or make better use of what it already has, as though those were two choices. I'd push back on the "or." With the lake, the canal, and the escarpment around us, St. Catharines has very little empty land left to grow into — most of our growth has to happen inside the existing footprint. So reusing what we have is how we build new.

The GM site is the clearest example: our biggest "existing" problem and our biggest "new homes" opportunity are the same fifty acres of serviced urban land. And this city has already proven it can be done — Heritage Point, a former landfill, was remediated and is now housing, back on the tax roll. The difference between that site and the GM lands is execution, not tools.

Downtown storefronts are the commercial version. Many sit empty not because nobody wants them, but because taking one over can mean inheriting years of unknown compliance issues that surface only after the keys change hands. Make the process predictable — clear, coordinated answers from City departments about what a building needs, before someone commits their savings to it — and existing space comes back into use without a dollar of subsidy. That's the business permitting page.

Underneath both is the same fact about how cities pay for things. Vacant and derelict properties consume services while contributing almost nothing in assessment. Infill uses infrastructure we've already built and already maintain, which is the cheapest growth a city can have. Housing isn't a competing priority with your tax bill. It's the same priority.

What the City actually controls

The City's side

  • Zoning — what can be built where, and whether gentle density is allowed as of right
  • Development approvals, and how long they take
  • Whether council supports good projects when qualified staff recommend them
  • The 2026 Community Improvement Plan — the City's own incentive programs for brownfield cleanup, rental housing, additional dwelling units, and façades
  • The Ontario Street Corridor Secondary Plan
  • Property standards and the vacant building registry — the tools that end derelict-property limbo

Not the City's side

  • Interest rates, construction costs, and the housing market
  • The provincial planning framework the City's plans must conform to
  • Soil and groundwater remediation on contaminated sites — the Province and the owner
  • Social and supportive housing programs — Niagara Region

What I'll do

  • Default to yes on staff-recommended housing. When professional staff recommend approving a housing project, my default is yes — and if I ever vote otherwise, I'll owe residents a specific, planning-based reason. That's a commitment you can check against every vote I cast.
  • Gentle density, as of right. More homes come from what a city actually controls: zoning and development approvals. I'll support zoning that lets the missing middle — additional units, laneway homes, small multiplexes, modest apartment buildings on main streets — proceed without a rezoning fight for each one.
  • Put derelict land back to work first. Long-vacant and derelict sites are the first place to look for new homes, because they already have pipes, roads, and neighbours. The GM site is the test case; the record is on the timeline.
  • Make the incentive program deliver homes, not paperwork. Council adopted a new Community Improvement Plan in June 2026. Under it, brownfield tax incentives are capped at actual remediation costs, rental projects have to include affordable units to qualify, projects that are entirely affordable rental get the largest rebate, and grants for additional dwelling units and storefront façades were doubled. Those are the right directions. I'll push for the City to track and publish what the program actually produces — units built, rents charged, remediation completed — so the next review is based on results, not applications.
  • Take the affordability definition seriously. The 2026 plan ties "affordable" to the provincial Development Charges Act definition. A resident argued at the public meeting that it should be tied to household income instead. That debate is legitimate, and the honest answer is that the City doesn't yet have the data to settle it. I'll push for the City to report what rents its incentives actually deliver, and to review the definition against those results at the plan's first review.
  • The Ontario Street corridor: yes to homes, with the questions answered. The concept plans presented in June 2026 would put thousands of new homes on and around the GM lands. I support housing there, including an affordable-rental component — that's the version that fixes the site rather than just filling it. But the concepts also show modelled new jobs in the low hundreds on what has been the city's largest employment site, against a corridor potential the City's own earlier materials put at roughly 2,900 jobs. Before this plan is adopted, residents deserve answers to four questions: how "jobs" are being counted; how homes and parks are sequenced against remediation, given the City's own principle that cleanup comes first; whether existing water, wastewater, and stormwater capacity can actually absorb the growth; and who pays for the bridge, road extensions, and parks the concepts assume. I'll ask them on the record.

What a councillor can't do

A councillor can't set interest rates, control construction costs, or rewrite the provincial planning framework. A councillor can't clean contaminated ground — that's the Province and the owner. And one councillor is one vote of thirteen. What a councillor can do is vote yes on good projects, support zoning that lets modest housing proceed without a fight, ask the questions a plan hasn't answered, and insist the City measure what its incentives actually build. That's a lot, and it's enough to matter.

Put existing land and buildings back to work, and measure success in new homes and open storefronts. The two halves of the question are one agenda.

St. Catharines has more tools than it uses. I'm running to make it use them.

This address reaches me, not a staffer:

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Sources

Everything on this page comes from public documents. If you want to check any of it:

Last updated: September 3, 2026