Human Resources committee  Culturally supportive housing is essentially housing that requires acknowledgement of indigenous—first nations, Métis and Inuit—cultural needs and accessibility within housing. That starts with design, so how it's put together, how the space is created, what's available in the space, how people access each other and how people create community.

Human Resources committee  Of course. I think one thing that would be really useful would be concepts of cultural safety. AHMA is developing cultural safety in housing, because it has definitely been in health. If municipalities actually applied cultural safety in reviewing their housing strategies and how they're working with indigenous people, I think we could reduce the amount of stigma and discrimination and racism that exists within the city itself, or the towns and so on, and maybe change some of the experiences of indigenous housing providers and housing service providers looking to establish affordable housing and low-income housing.

Human Resources committee  I'm not the person to talk to about on-reserve housing. I don't do—

Human Resources committee  Sure. All of our housing units are off reserve. Of that 2,100 are being built in the next two years, and 5,500 are already built and are servicing indigenous people right now.

Human Resources committee  Yes, that's for the majority. I think there are one or two projects that have partnerships on reserve, as well, but that's all off reserve.

Human Resources committee  Yes, thank you for the opportunity. Absolutely, the majority of the municipalities across British Columbia don't even mention or have indigenous priority within their housing strategies or plans. We did a study, I believe, two years ago or a year and a half ago that identified that.

Human Resources committee  Sure. We are currently looking at developing some indigenous complex care, which is intensive supportive housing in British Columbia, and we're running into zoning issues in these developments. They're not new developments. They are builds with renovations, and the concern we're facing is that, in some communities, we can have only six units.

Human Resources committee  Thank you for the opportunity. With the majority of the indigenous housing providers off reserve, there is no discrimination against the tenant. If there's space and a tenant meets the criteria—and the criteria don't include being indigenous—the space will be given. The organizations themselves are indigenous run and have an indigenous board of directors and, of course, priority is given to the indigenous community, but we don't discriminate.

Human Resources committee  Good morning. Thank you for having me here today. My name is Celeste Hayward and I'm from the Aboriginal Housing Management Association in British Columbia. The Aboriginal Housing Management Association, which we call AHMA, has 25 years of expertise in advancing housing rights for indigenous people in urban, rural and northern communities.