In recent years, declining affordability for low-income households in Frenchs Forest has driven an increase in demand for affordable and social housing. Given the limited availability of affordable and social housing in the area, the NSW Government proposal for the Frenchs Forest Growth Area provided a rare but valuable opportunity to address this shortfall.

After a consultation period that commenced in July 2021, the Government has now finalised the Frenchs Forest Place Strategy. In our view the final strategy has some strong elements but fails on some fundamentals.

Shelter NSW’s submission primarily focused on ways to address the housing needs of this growing group of low-middle income households, including key workers that will be employed at the Northern Beaches Hospital in the future. 

Given the availability of public land on the old high school site, we advocated for an affordable housing target of 20% that would remain so in perpetuity, and for a commitment of 10% social housing.

It is disappointing to see there is no social housing proposed for the site. On a positive note, the Strategy proposes 10-15% affordable housing (up to 250 dwellings), which we strongly supported. However, as per the new Housing SEPP, this housing is only guaranteed to be affordable for a period of 15 years.