Addressing crime and safety is at the top of the latest list of Kelowna council priorities.
Other priorities for the newest term include affordable housing, homelessness, transportation, agriculture and climate and environment.
“The actions and priority areas reflect council’s response to what our citizens are saying is important, and are expected to be revisited during council’s term,” reads a report headed to council on Monday.
Alongside the six priorities, there are also 22 action items that council hopes to accomplish over the next three years.
In addition, the report lists 16 results the city hopes to achieve.
This includes increasing the number of residents who feel safe in Kelowna while decreasing the number of business break and enters and thefts.
According to the latest update from the city’s top cop, robberies increased by more than 40% in 2022 while commercial break and enters increased by 26.2% to 857 cases reported in 2022.
Priorities to reduce those numbers include establishing a strategy to address property crime, provide support for businesses in identified improvement areas while establishing a safety task force.
Another priority to address crime and safety is to partner with the “provincial ministries responsible for mental health and problematic substance use to improve local conditions.”
Affordable housing is the second priority on the list and council wants to improve access for residents whether they rent or own, improve the city’s supply of affordable housing and increase the supply of housing options for people with low to moderate incomes.
Priorities include acquiring city owned land to build more affordable housing, increase the number of rental units with below market rents and partner on the creation of a low-cost affordable housing pilot project.
Developing an emergency winter shelter program and advocating for purpose built permanent shelters with “wrap-around” supports and graduated housing options are identified as priorities to address homelessness.
Under transportation, the city would like to explore modes of transportation between UBCO/YLW and downtown, improve transit service, expand the transit pass program, improve traffic flow and capacity on major roads.
Facilitating the creation of a permanent home for the Kelowna Farmer’s Market is a priority under agriculture.
Increasing the urban tree canopy and creating a pilot energy concierge program to enable retrofits in buildings are priorities to address climate change and environmental concerns.
In addition to approving the priorities, city staff recommend that council direct them to report back on the progress of the priorities and action items in six, 12 and 18 months.
Council will review these priorities on March 20 at 1:30 pm.
