Newfoundland and Labrador Housing will be tearing down a row of vacant homes on Livingstone Street in St. John’s that were damaged by fire last week.
The province says only one of the six units affected had a tenant, and that person has been put up in temporary accommodations before moving into another NL Housing unit next week.
Most of the units had been boarded up and vacant, and while repair work was underway, the units had been repeatedly targeted by vandals and had been broken into numerous times, causing extensive delays.
NDP leader Jim Dinn recently raised concerns about the number of vacant and boarded-up homes in the area and what he says is the government’s negligence in failing to get them back up and running.
The province says more than 750 provincially-owned homes were vacated over a two-year period between April of 2023 and April of 2025. Repairs required ranged from typical sprucing-up to major and lengthy structural repairs.
The province says that, at that same time, more than 800 homes were refurbished and made available to families.
Work is now underway to construct 32 new units on Janeway Place in St. John’s, while work is expected to begin this year on a new 40-unit apartment building in the same area.
