Regina Minute: Issue 124

Regina Minute - Your weekly one-minute summary of Regina politics

📅 This Week In Regina: 📅

• The Development Appeals Board meets tomorrow at 5:30 pm to hear a single appeal concerning a property at 352 Angus Street in the Coronation Park neighbourhood. The Board rules on individual appeals of development permit and zoning decisions, and no other matters are on the agenda. 
  
  
• Federated Co-op Limited is seeking City approval to build a 510-bed temporary work camp next to its Co-op Refinery Complex in east Regina, on land north of McDonald Street and west of Fleet Street. Because any work camp larger than 20 beds requires a discretionary use approval, the application must go to City Council after a public and technical review that is already underway. The company says the camp would give the refinery flexibility if extra workers are needed to operate, maintain or repair the site. The timing is contentious because the company is in collective bargaining with Unifor Local 594, which represents more than 700 refinery workers under a contract that expired earlier this year. Local 594 president Richard Exner called the application premature and warned it would harm his members. The Saskatchewan Federation of Labour condemned the proposal as a "scab camp" and urged residents to oppose it through the City's public review process. The refinery's last labour dispute, in 2019, ran six months and included blockades and arrests.
  
  
• A new City growth monitoring report says Regina's housing supply is expanding alongside rapid population growth, which the City puts at 27,000 people since 2021. The report cites Royal Bank figures ranking Regina as the most affordable major Canadian city to buy a home, with a benchmark price of $356,400 as of June 2026. Building permits for housing hit a five-year high in 2025, with 1,674 units approved, 58% of them in multi-unit buildings and 15% single detached homes. Backyard and secondary suites accounted for 18% of the units approved, which the City points to as evidence of a more diverse housing mix. Over the past five years, 59 chronically vacant lots have been redeveloped into 411 new units through infill. Stu Niebergall, president of the Regina and Region Home Builders Association, said no single housing type will meet the city's future needs and that a balanced mix will be critical to keeping housing affordable.
  
  
• Community advocates gathered Thursday at a vacant Regina lot that once held 24 government-owned social housing units, demanding the Government of Saskatchewan stop demolishing social housing unless it commits to rebuilding. The units were removed after the complex was deemed unsafe following a 2024 fire. The Province says it has 2,795 rentable housing units in Regina, of which 2,453 are occupied, and that most of the 342 vacant units are available now or within 30 days. Peter Gilmer of the Regina Anti-Poverty Ministry argued the public spends more on the costs of homelessness than it would to provide the social housing that is needed. The demonstration comes as more people move into tents around the city.
  
  
• Speaking of encampments, eople are again living in tents at Pepsi Park, and this time the City says it has no immediate plans to clear the encampment. Volunteers are providing food, supplies and addiction services on site, and say the City has supplied portable toilets while they press for more affordable housing. That marks a shift from the last encampment at the park, which the City dismantled before moving residents to a newly created emergency shelter. In a statement, the City said it recognizes homelessness is a growing challenge and continues to work with partner agencies and other levels of government on both urgent and long-term solutions. Addictions counsellors and the Newo Yotina Friendship Centre are among those assisting people at the site. How long the camp remains may depend on how long the City allows it and whether other housing options are found.

🚨 This Week’s Action Item: 🚨

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