Today at my favourite cafe:  yet another commiserating chat over morning coffee, as Katie and her Mom tell me about where they’ll be living.  Not in Roncy, at least.  Not any more.

For years they lived in a two-bedroom, in a house, which – did you guess? — was sold, eliminating yet another apartment in the neighbourhood.

They searched for months, to no avail.  They too have been priced out of the neighbourhood.   “It’s just arithmetic!” I rant.  “Supply and demand. Keep the supply low, you keep prices high.”

“You’re right!” Mom says.   I know I’m right.  I just don’t know what to do about it.   As we gain our corporate lawyers and consultants and financial analysts and business owners, we lose our musicians, our students, our low-income single parents, our servers, our postal workers, our writers, our philosophers, our soothsayers.

What we could do about it, is create incentives for dramatically increasing housing, through smallish scale developments, sprinkled evenly throughout the community.   But if we allow ourselves to be overtaken by ‘fear of development’, and don’t take on the responsibility of collectively Planning our neighbourhood, Roncy won’t be Roncy anymore.