Affordable housing strategy update
In 2010, Ontario launched the
Long Term Affordable Housing
Strategy, which has now been updated
with feedback from communities
to make sure that local needs
are met.
The province has introduced a number of new legislative measures and is investing $178 million over the next three years to ensure that people have access to affordable and adequate housing, to help them secure employment, raise a family and build strong communities.
One of these measures is proposing the mandatory inclusion of affordable housing units in new development projects, or “inclusionary zoning”.
Habitat for Humanity is an organization that already works to give people a decent place to live, and the CEO of their Heartland Ontario office, Jeff Duncan, has seen areas of Toronto that have been including more affordable areas in new residential areas that are build, and is glad to see the idea moving across the province.
“In our community there’s between eight to 10 per cent of the population living in some kind of a housing issue, whether it’s the proper kind of housing, or so on, but they need decent, affordable housing… It’s pretty much right across the province that we have an issue. I think anything we can do as communities is a good thing.”
Duncan said that Habitat for Humanity has a good relationship with local developers and homebuilders, and even though every build is different, people do what they can to help. He added that one of the key issues in their work is finding land to build on, and this provincial strategy will ease that burden.
“I think we have better a community, a more inclusive community when we have what you would call a continuum of housing, of higher end housing right down to affordable housing. It gives people in affordable housing a chance to move up as well, and change, and stay in the community where their kids go to school.”
Other initiatives included in the strategy are a proposed framework for a portable housing benefit that would allow people who receive housing assistance to choose where they want to live, and an investment of more than $17,000 over the next three years for a portable housing benefit that will eventually support up to 3,000 survivors of domestic violence.
The province also wants to develop a framework for a supportive housing policy to improve access to services such as counselling, dispensing medication and life skills, as well as support the construction of around 1,500 new supportive housing units with an investment of $100 million over the next three years.
All of this is to support Ontario’s goal of ending the problem of chronic homelessness in the next 10 years, and comes at the same time as a proposal for a guaranteed minimum inco me for people living in poverty that will give them income security, but not discourage them from entering the workforce. Ontario Finance Minister, Charles Sousa, is still in the process of choosing a community to be the test site for guaranteed income.
The province has introduced a number of new legislative measures and is investing $178 million over the next three years to ensure that people have access to affordable and adequate housing, to help them secure employment, raise a family and build strong communities.
One of these measures is proposing the mandatory inclusion of affordable housing units in new development projects, or “inclusionary zoning”.
Habitat for Humanity is an organization that already works to give people a decent place to live, and the CEO of their Heartland Ontario office, Jeff Duncan, has seen areas of Toronto that have been including more affordable areas in new residential areas that are build, and is glad to see the idea moving across the province.
“In our community there’s between eight to 10 per cent of the population living in some kind of a housing issue, whether it’s the proper kind of housing, or so on, but they need decent, affordable housing… It’s pretty much right across the province that we have an issue. I think anything we can do as communities is a good thing.”
Duncan said that Habitat for Humanity has a good relationship with local developers and homebuilders, and even though every build is different, people do what they can to help. He added that one of the key issues in their work is finding land to build on, and this provincial strategy will ease that burden.
“I think we have better a community, a more inclusive community when we have what you would call a continuum of housing, of higher end housing right down to affordable housing. It gives people in affordable housing a chance to move up as well, and change, and stay in the community where their kids go to school.”
Other initiatives included in the strategy are a proposed framework for a portable housing benefit that would allow people who receive housing assistance to choose where they want to live, and an investment of more than $17,000 over the next three years for a portable housing benefit that will eventually support up to 3,000 survivors of domestic violence.
The province also wants to develop a framework for a supportive housing policy to improve access to services such as counselling, dispensing medication and life skills, as well as support the construction of around 1,500 new supportive housing units with an investment of $100 million over the next three years.
All of this is to support Ontario’s goal of ending the problem of chronic homelessness in the next 10 years, and comes at the same time as a proposal for a guaranteed minimum inco me for people living in poverty that will give them income security, but not discourage them from entering the workforce. Ontario Finance Minister, Charles Sousa, is still in the process of choosing a community to be the test site for guaranteed income.
