Build Canada event on Wednesday
Talking to Build Canada folks
Understanding Canada: Vancouver’s Housing Market. This event is part of a series hosted by the Vancouver chapter of Build Canada. (I joined Build Canada’s Discord server recently.) We’ll be going through a couple explanations of why housing in Vancouver is so scarce and expensive.
When: Wednesday, January 21, 6 to 8 pm
Where: Gastown - for the location, please register
Event description:
In this session, we’ll be joined by special guest Russil Wvong, author of Vancouver Needs More Housing, for a deep dive into the forces shaping our city’s housing market.
Russil is a volunteer with Abundant Housing Vancouver and the Vancouver Area Neighbours Association, and has written extensively about why housing scarcity persists—even when there’s broad agreement that we need to build more.
He poses the question: “Why do we regulate new housing like it’s a nuclear power plant, and tax it like it’s a gold mine?”
Join us as we unpack this question—and others like it—through shared readings, breakout group discussions, and a collective conversation about what high-leverage change could actually look like for Vancouver and BC.
This Session’s Readings:
Schedule
6:00 PM: Doors Open
6:30 PM: Session Begins
8:00 PM: Session Ends
A couple introductory slides:
What is Build Canada?
Former Shopify executive Daniel Debow backs ‘Build Canada’ initiative to boost economy and prosperity. Pippa Norman, Globe and Mail, February 2025.
Leaders in Canada’s tech sector are launching a project aimed at shaping policy to create a more prosperous economy and address their frustration with the country’s stagnant innovation agenda.
Titled Build Canada, the project launched Tuesday with a core team of five volunteers, including former Shopify vice-president Daniel Debow, who left the company last month. By publishing weekly policy memos to its website and encouraging others to share them via social media, Mr. Debow said, the initiative’s goal is to give Canadian entrepreneurs a platform to publicize their ideas in a meaningful way.
Whoever the next prime minister is, Mr. Debow said he hopes they can use some of the ideas put forth by Build Canada to strengthen the country’s economy and make it less vulnerable to bullying from the U.S.
“Economic strength is crucial,” he said, explaining that means figuring out how to sell more high-value goods to the world, how to sell better to Canadians and also “how to get along with what is a new America.”
A couple of Build Canada policy memos related to housing:
Stop Taxing Homes Out of Existence. Brad Carr, March 2025.
Free Zoning to Build More Homes. Julie Di Lorenzo, March 2025.