Six homes connected to suspected criminal activity could soon become affordable housing under a new approach by the Manitoba government to the seizure and sale of criminal assets.
The six properties, in the Point Douglas neighbourhood near downtown Winnipeg, were seized under the province’s Criminal Property Forfeiture Act.
The law allows justice officials to launch a civil proceeding in which they ask a judge to give them assets that are the proceeds or instruments of unlawful activity. Normally, the assets are sold at roughly market value and the money raised is given to victims, victim service agencies and police.
This time, the province is looking to sell the six properties for $1 each to an Indigenous or non-profit organization, which would then develop affordable single-family homes for sale to low- and moderate-income families….