New Canadians' Settlement Experiences in Vancouver's Suburbs, with Suggestions for Policy Directions Regarding Rental Housing and Community Services

ABSTRACT

Despite the rapidly increasing immigrant population in Canada and the important role immigrants play in shaping the social, cultural, and economic landscapes of its cities and suburbs, we know relatively little about recent immigrants' settlement experiences, including their experiences as renters and use of local services, both of which are key factors in successful integration. Based on a survey of sixty-two recently arrived, low-income immigrants, this study examines their settlement and housing experiences in Richmond and Surrey, two fast-growing suburbs of Vancouver. Suggestions for better serving programs and policies, elicited from this diverse group of immigrants and refugees, are reviewed within the current political context in Canada.

KEYWORDS:

• Canada
• recent immigrants
• rental housing
• suburbs
• Vancouver

Acknowledgements

The author thanks Mr. Sherman Chan (MOSAIC Settlement Services) for supporting this project, and each of the organizations in Surrey and Richmond that offered advice and helped recruit immigrants for this study; the survey respondents; and his research assistant Joshabelle Josephson for her great work. Appreciation is also extended to Dr. Valerie Preston (York University) for her helpful comments on an earlier version of the questionnaire.

Funding

The author acknowledges the financial support of Metropolis British Columbia in awarding a research grant.

Notes

¹ Both Richmond and Surrey are incorporated as cities; however, they function as new suburbs to the larger metropolis of Vancouver.

² To clarify terminology, Canada stopped building state-owned public housing in the 1960s and is unlikely to return to this model. Various other housing models, including income-mixed, nonequity cooperative housing, as well as municipal nonprofit housing and “private” (e.g., church-sponsored) nonprofit housing, were developed from the 1970s until the mid-1990s. The term social housing covers all models of nonmarket housing.