At a time when it's difficult for first-time home buyers to break into the housing market, it's disappointing city council opted not to re-visit its decision that spurned the rezoning of land for a new trailer park, says its former developer.

"Some of the councillors don't seem to get it," Berry Bellchambers commented outside council chambers Monday night following the vote.

Mayor Bev Buckway, along with councillors Dave Austin and Jeanine Myhre, were the only members of council to vote in favour of re-considering the vote in March. That vote saw the defeat of the proposed rezoning of the land across from Bellchambers' Takhini Mobile Home Park.

Though it was a 3-3 tie vote in March, it was defeated because where there is a tie vote, a motion is defeated.

Austin, who brought forward the move to re-consider it, wasn't at the March meeting and couldn't phone in because the city's conference call system didn't allow for more than one caller at that time. Another councillor who was absent had already phoned in to that meeting.

With the tie vote and not having an opportunity to put forward his vote at the time, Austin decided to bring back the matter for reconsideration.

Given the shortage of affordable housing in town, Bellchambers said, he was surprised by council's move not to even re-consider it.

A number of council members have been in municipal government for a "long, long time," he said.

The current housing situation could have been predicted five or six years ago, with the city not being proactive in dealing with it, he argued.

"They're still there with their head in the sand," Bellchambers said. "It's making it very difficult for the young and lower-income people, so I'm quite disappointed because I think we had a really good project that would have been very viable."

The proposal was also met with opposition early in last night's meeting when a resident living in nearby Mountainview Place made a presentation to council.

Mountainview Place is a condominium corporation where trailer owners also have possession of their land as opposed to sites like Takhini, where trailer owners pay lot fees to rent land. However, it is also zoned for and made up of mobile homes across from the Northland mobile home park.

Objecting to another trailer park in the area, Lorraine Hemstock told council she chose to live at Mountainview Place because of the "yet untouched beauty of the area leading onto Range Road."

She argued Takhini Mobile Home Park should be brought up to better standards before any permits be considered for "another possible eyesore as time goes by."

Although Hemstock said there was nothing wrong with trailer parks as an affordable housing option, she argued they shouldn't be developed at the expense of the greenbelt.

In the area of the proposed park, across from Takhini Trailer Park, there is a walkway residents use to get to Yukon College and bus stops because the street has no sidewalk on either side.

If the proposed new park was an extension of Takhini Mobile Home Park, Hemstock argued, then why not upgrade the older trailers there to newer models, thereby doing some "necessary clean-up?"

Takhini shouldn't just be upgraded along the side of the street for "aesthetic purposes," she added.

Hemstock argued about 80 per cent of the trailers in Takhini need to be upgraded to new standards.

She then said she believes all trailer parks in the city should be brought up to newer standards.

"I know if I was the owner of Takhini Mobile Home Park, I would work on its condition first before going on to another project of this type,"

Hemstock commented, stating the issue is of "extreme importance".

As Bellchambers noted after last night's meeting though, he has been working to upgrade the park and has bought and upgraded or put in new trailers in some areas.

He estimated he's spent between $700,000 and $800,000 already fixing up the park.

"They've been upgraded and we bought 20 mobile homes from a slum landlord and we're completely re-building from the ground up," he said.

That work takes a lot of time and money, Bellchambers said.

Among the more evident changes to the trailer park in the last couple of years are a new playground next to Range Road, fencing around the trailers and in some cases completely new trailers, where Bellchambers has bought the homes.

Many of the new trailers have been featured in real estate ads.

"What they don't realize is I don't own the mobile home," he said. "What they (trailer owners) can do is dictated by their income levels and their priorities."