Hinton weathers tight housing market in wake of Jasper fire
Flames forced everyone but the firefighters to leave Jasper in late July.
They returned to devastation.
The fast-moving wildfire destroyed or damaged 356 buildings in Jasper National Park's townsite – one-third of the community.
And while not all of them were residential, Jasper lost 820 housing units as a result, leaving about 1,800 residents – more than a third of the town's population of 4,800 – homeless.
Town staff say Jasperites spread far and wide – to Edmonton, British Columbia, even as far away as California – but many landed as close to home as possible: in Hinton.
Hinton realtor Jeff MacLeod says those evacuees entered a competitive housing market.
Those who could afford it bought a house. MacLeod says some of those homes had previously been rentals.
"You now have one less rental (on the market)," said MacLeod, representing the Alberta West Realtors Association.
"So you have one more family looking for rental, less rentals available, and so on and so on."
Hinton Mayor Nicholas Nissen. (Jeremy Thompson/CTV News Edmonton)Hinton Mayor Nicholas Nissen says housing had been a pressing issue in the town of 10,000 before the Jasperwildfire as its population is growing like the rest of Alberta.
Now with the influx of displaced people, Nissen told CTV News Edmonton this week the Alberta community on the doorstep of Jasper National Park anticipates its housing market will be "under pressure for the foreseeable future."
He said Hinton can, over the short term, absorb and "hide these sort of populations, but if you think about Jasper National Park in general – before the fires, Jasper was pretty close to being full."
"There were more and more tourists coming every year because of international advertising campaigns that had been highly effective," Nissen said.
"It's a beautiful place. I don't blame people for wanting to come and see it at all, but the reality was that overflow was going to start showing up in Hinton in a big way. Now it's just accelerated, so we have to get those permanent housing structures built."
The Town of Hinton on Nov. 5, 2024. (Jeremy Thompson/CTV News Edmonton)Those permanent structures include those built by private industry – Nissen points out on a map various housing projects across the town, including fourplexes and so-called tiny homes – as well as a government-funded replacement for seniors housing that burned down.
No one tracks how many displaced Jasperites now call Hinton home these days, but for a community that's already behind on housing supply, adding even a few hundred people has consequences.
Renters have been dealt 90-day eviction notices and rent increases in the hundreds of dollars, says Kristen Chambers, a town councillor and the chief administrative officer of the Evergreens Foundation, a non-profit housing management agency in the region that helps about 200 families with housing costs.
Chambers says as people spend more of their paycheques on housing, they're leaning more on services such as the food bank.
"Teenaged children who are going out and getting jobs so that they can contribute to the family income in order for the family to stay housed, that's probably the one that's the hardest to stomach, but it's a reality that we're seeing," she told CTV News Edmonton.
Evergreens Foundation chief administrative officer and Hinton town councillor. (Jeremy Thompson/CTV News Edmonton)Hinton has several hotels and temporary accommodations, which is where many Jasperites are still living, including a handful of seniors.
Come spring, seasonal workers in heavy industries and tourism will come looking for those rooms.
Nissen said from Hinton's standpoint, an influx of people moving to the community "is nothing new," noting several major industrial projects coming to the town in forestry, mining, oil and gas, and at the long-established pulp mill that's about to go through a significant restructuring, along with seasonal work that brings people to the community.
"We're going to see different groups of people taking up space in our hotel rooms. We're going to see various people renting houses in our community for two-, three-, four-year time periods, and I anticipate that some of these people that came to Hinton during this event are never going to leave," he said.
The plight of the displaced Jasper residents offers "a lot of little nuances" to Hinton's housing situation, Chambers said, as the latter typically has a low vacancy rate and a high rental rate.
A Hinton apartment building with a 'No Vacancy' sign. (Jeremy Thompson/CTV News Edmonton)"There's a lot of industry around here, a lot of those types of things, and not a lot of multi-family apartment buildings," she said.
"That's certainly been tough. We've also had our Pine Grove Manor seniors apartments which burned down, so that was 33 seniors that we had to try to find independent housing for."
Chambers is hopeful the 250 apartments the province promised to build in Jasper can help ease the pressure on Hinton housing eventually.
"In the meantime, I think it's going to be a really tight winter for the community of Hinton for housing," she said.
CTVNews.ca Top Stories
'Canada will be absolutely fine': Justin Trudeau, his ministers and Pierre Poilievre congratulate Donald Trump
Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau and members of his cabinet congratulated Donald Trump Wednesday morning on his second United States presidential election win, amid questions about how the federal government intends to navigate a second term.
What Donald Trump's election victory could mean for Canada
Following president-elect Donald Trump's decisive election victory, there are sure to be significant knock-on effects for Canada. Here's a look at the different areas in which a second Trump presidency may affect Canadians.
Kamala Harris concedes: Here's what she said in her speech
Democratic Vice-President Kamala Harris conceded the U.S. election to Republican Donald Trump Wednesday afternoon, telling her supporters that her 'heart is full.'
Canada orders wind up of TikTok's Canadian business, app access to continue
The federal government is ordering the dissolution of TikTok's Canadian business after a national security review of the Chinese company behind the social media platform, but stopped short of ordering people to stay off the app.
Newfoundland hockey player suspended, banned from local arena after off-ice fight with fan
A combination of a thrown stick and thrown punches have given a senior hockey player in Newfoundland a three-game suspension and an indefinite ban from one of his league's six arenas.
Controversial Australian Olympic breakdancer 'Raygun' retires from competition
Australian breaker Rachael Gunn has told a Sydney radio station that she plans to retire from competition just three months after her unconventional routine at the Paris Olympics led to her being ridiculed and spawned conspiracy theories about how she qualified for the Games.
Sleepy during the day? You may be at higher risk for a pre-dementia syndrome, study finds
If you find yourself sleepy during your daily activities in your older age, you may need to consider it more than an inconvenience — since the fatigue may indicate you’re at higher risk for developing a condition that can lead to dementia, a new study has found.
Kamala Harris made a historic dash for the White House. Here's why she fell short.
"Sometimes the fight takes a while. That doesn't mean we won't win," U.S. Vice-President Kamala Harris said on Wednesday in her concession speech.
Who won the popular vote? U.S. election vote totals from the past 40 years
Donald Trump won the U.S. presidency on Tuesday, and as of Wednesday morning, was also ahead in the popular vote. Historically, though, the candidate with the most votes hasn’t always won the contest.