Edmonton city council has moved to ask for a report about small-scale infill housing’s impact on the price of nearby homes - though city staff warns the findings may not be definitive. Council voted 9-4 on Tuesday for city administration to present its findings publicly during an urban planning committee next year. Ward tastawiyiniwak Coun. Karen Principe put forth the motion after hearing concerns from Edmontonians. “Some are concerned that their property values are decreasing, while others are noticing that their property taxes are increasing due to a higher assessment,” she told council on Tuesday. “This is just a way for us to gather clear, Edmonton-specific data to have the transparent facts and details to ensure that we’re seeing the positive trends we’re expecting and see if there are any measures we should be taking.” Details and methodology, however, underwent more than an hour of review as council tossed around the value of such a broad report, what it would cover and, subsequently, whether it should be made publicly available. Ward papastew Coun. Michael Janz’s amendment to make the findings a private memo to council alone was shot down. He argued creating a public report to be presented to a committee would see an uneven turnout of Edmontonians with preconceptions about infill, given the amount of opinions already found online. “Pulling (infill data) into a public aggregated report to a committee is just going to be a recipe for ‘he says, she says, they say,’” he said. “It’s like if we asked for a report on the existence of God.” Similarly, Ward Sspomitapi Coun. Jo-Anne Wright attempted to clarify wording – again shot down – as councillors worked to understand whether the report would acknowledge derelict properties and other extraneous factors that could contribute to a neighbourhood’s value. City business operations director Stephen Leroux said the entire report would pose a “chicken and the egg” question about the impact of infill on market values. The report, he warned, would require nuance. “Is it (decreasing value) because of infill, or is it because of everything else?” he said Tuesday. “I don’t think that we’re ever going to be able to say with certainty that on a broad sort of mass-appraisal basis that infill has done this or that.” Ward Anirniq Coun. Erin Rutherford opposed the motion on the grounds of a lack of methodology, despite acknowledging the optics of shooting down such a hot infill topic. “The fact that we are going to use a lot of city resources, even the amount of resources required for properly scoping this, is significant,” she said, “let alone the fact that I’d much rather see a refinement.” A public report on city administration’s findings is due in the third quarter of 2027.
