The Central Okanagan may join Kamloops by creating a rent bank to ease the risk of homelessness

The Central Okanagan may join Kamloops and Prince George in bringing in a new style of banking specifically for people on the brink of homelessness.

The B.C. government has jumped on board to provide funding to support existing banks and start new ones and Central Okanagan Regional District directors will get their first look at it this week.

The Kamloops Elizabeth Fry Society, for example, launched its rent bank in 2013 and there are now 10 in B.C., according to the Rent Bank B.C. website.

The idea will be presented to a committee of the Regional District of Central Okanagan March 12 promoting a region-wide initiative. This follows on the heels of a March 3 information session where eight of the non-profit organizations attending were potentially interested in taking it on.

At its most basic, the bank is designed to provide “repayable loans to households at risk of eviction for reasons such as non-payment of rent or utilities,” the report to the board states.

Or it could be used to borrow money for things like damage deposits.

Other rent banks also advocate for renters and/or mediate between tenants and landlords, help tenants find other funding programs or find agencies that can help with food, clothing and transportation.

The exact parameters of what services this rent bank will provide have to be worked out by the organization running the bank, if one can be found, Dnaika Dudzik, the regional district’s environmental planner, told iNFOnews.ca.

If it’s supported by the committee, a more detailed report will be presented at a future regular meeting of the board to outline in more detail the process to set up a Rent Bank.

The goal is to have a bank operating this summer, Dadzik said.


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Rob Munro

Rob Munro has a long history in journalism after starting an underground newspaper in Whitehorse called the Yukon Howl in 1980. He spent five years at the 100 Mile Free Press, starting in the darkroom, moving on to sports and news reporting before becoming the advertising manager. He came to Kelowna in 1989 as a reporter for the Kelowna Daily Courier, and spent the 1990s mostly covering city hall. For most of the past 20 years he worked full time for the union representing newspaper workers throughout B.C. He’s returned to his true love of being a reporter with a special focus on civic politics

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