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“We’ve gone as far as we can go in terms of having the market provide our housing here,” Stewart told attendees. He said governments now have to focus on boosting co-operative and other non-profit housing in Vancouver.

“If we don’t, our city is going to fall apart,” he said.

Breakout panels slated for the three-day conference indicated some of the biggest challenges in housing, including public consultation, the high cost of rent, the relative scarcity of supportive units, and inadequate supports for those aging out of care and for seniors.

Others, including Lani Brunn, focused on the enduring homelessness crisis in the region. The social and community planner presented some of the findings from a series of first-hand, in-depth interviews she conducted with women in Vancouver’s Downtown Eastside as part of her master’s studies at Simon Fraser University’s urban studies program.

In interviews with 11 women, she found many commonalities. Six were 55 years and older, five talked about mental health issues, three were in the sex trade and two women had become homeless by age 12, among other similarities.

Brunn also found some differences. She said about half of the women she spoke to desired to live outside the DTES. The other half preferred to remain in it, for the community it offered.

Brunn presented an anecdote to illustrate that point. One woman told Brunn she needed housing, but insisted that it be outside the DTES, where she feared she would return to the sex trade and to drugs. She ended up in a beautiful new building, but it was in the DTES. When Brunn later visited her at the new home it was in shambles and covered in graffiti. It looked as though the walls were caving in.