By Ruby Pratka
Local Journalism Initiative
After more than a decade of waiting, of bureaucratic struggles and false starts, the Coopérative de solidarité des Voisins de Sutton housing complex was formally inaugurated on Sept. 23. The complex, built on land once owned by the Anglican Church, will provide housing below market rates for 18 local families, 16 of whom have been moved in since July.
“It took ten years to get the project off the ground,” said former Sutton mayor Ken Hill, a longtime board member of Habitations Abordables Sutton (HAS), the nonprofit which was the driving force behind the co-op’s creation. After several false starts and amid worrisome inflation, construction began last year and was finally completed June 29. “Everything took more time than we thought it did because of the bureaucracy, but we’re so happy that it’s finally accomplished,” he said.
Hill explained that a few committed volunteers launched HAS in 2013; he joined the organization a year later, while serving as a town councillor under then-mayor Louis Dandeneault, to help the group find a new piece of land after the first plot they chose turned out to be contaminated. He remained on the board after his departure from municipal politics, to see the project through. On March 1, HAS formally turned over control of the co-op to a board made up primarily of residents. “We were there to build, not to manage,” Hill said. “There’s nothing better than having residents taking care of their own buildings.”
Hill said HAS received about 40 applications for the 18 units, which are all reserved for families with children living at home. Applicants had to commit to staying involved in the day-to-day management and maintenance in the co-op. Some applicants who had grown up in Sutton but found themselves priced out of the rental market were able to move back to town, Hill said. “The average rent for a 5 ½ in our buildings is $900 … but it’s more than just below-market rent; it’s a community.”
Sutton Mayor Robert Benoit and his administration have been among the project’s backers, granting $338,000 in funding (including $101,000 for the purchase of the land) and a 25-year property tax break with an estimated value of $370,311 over the life of the project. Benoit estimated the total cost of the project at about $8 million, the bulk of which came from the Quebec government. “The development of this project was very difficult … and that’s why I think we need to congratulate the people who put in volunteer work because they were believers, because they had a vision for affordable housing.” He also thanked Brome-Missisquoi MNA Isabelle Charest for the provincial government’s involvement.
Benoit said the project was “interesting” for the municipality because it would allow young, working-age people to live in town, “who will live and work in the community, and also work toward our collective wellbeing.”
The co-op is the second housing co-op to open in Sutton after the Co-op Vive Sutton, a six-unit shared house for active seniors that opened in 2021, according to Guillaume Brien, director general of the Fédération des coopératives de l’habitation de l’Estrie (FCHE). A third project, piloted by a homeowners’ group and dubbed La Vie Au Boisé, is in development.
Brien said of the 55 co-ops that are members of the FCHE, around three-quarters are in Sherbrooke, but projects are emerging in every MRC in the region; a co-op for young families is taking applications in Frelighsburg.
“There’s a lot of enthusiasm [around] living in community,” Brien said. “With the housing crisis and the climate crisis and all the other crises, there’s constant insecurity. If you build trust and security with your neighbour, that’s security, that’s belonging.”
Brien said anyone interested in working toward establishing a co-op in their municipality should find other interested people in their community and get in touch with Entraide Habitat Estrie, a nonprofit created by the FCHE which guides groups through the many administrative and logistical steps involved in creating a co-op.