Starts With Home Talks - Stop the Loss of Affordable Housing in Ottawa

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PRESS RELEASE

OTTAWA, ON April 19th 2022 The University of Ottawa’s Centre for Research on Education and Community Services and the Alliance to End Homelessness Ottawa will host a virtual discussion on Wednesday, April 20th, at 7PM, to explore how Ottawa can and must stop the loss of affordable housing units in the city. This is the second event of the “Starts With Home” campaign, exploring one of its three key messages. 

PRESS RELEASE

OTTAWA, ON April 19th 2022 The University of Ottawa’s Centre for Research on Education and Community Services and the Alliance to End Homelessness Ottawa will host a virtual discussion on Wednesday, April 20th, at 7PM, to explore how Ottawa can and must stop the loss of affordable housing units in the city. This is the second event of the “Starts With Home” campaign, exploring one of its three key messages. 

Participants will hear from:

  • Benoit Langevin (Montreal City Councilor involved in developing legislation to tackle this challenge at the local level).
  • Sahar Raza (Project Manager of the National Right to Housing Network)
  • John Redin (advocate and tenant of Herongate - a community that experienced one of the largest mass evictions in Canada)

“In Ottawa, we lose 7 affordable units for every 1 that is built.  Stopping the loss of affordable housing is as critical as building more.  Housing has become a commodity rather than a basic need, resulting in tenant displacement to make way for higher paying tenants.  We saw this with the Herongate evictions. Without adequate tenant protections and proactive acquisition of older rental buildings, the list of people in need of affordable housing will only grow. We have to turn this around, which in part means protecting what we still have.” - Kaite Burkholder Harris , Executive Director

“Starts With Home” is a coalition of people, organizations, businesses and community groups joining together to build public and political support to end homelessness and housing need in Ottawa. The campaign launched with over 100 organizational endorsements, and the list is growing. Notable endorsers include Beckta Restaurant Group, Ottawa Tourism, Ottawa Board of Trade, CHEO, and Ottawa’s Poet Laureate, Albert Dumont, among many others. 

Interested individuals and organizations can  join the April 20th  discussion, read the platform, and register their endorsement of the plan, at www.startswithhome.ca.

For media inquiries and interviews, please contact:

Kaite Burkholder Harris, Executive Director                                                                                                                                    Alliance to End Homelessness Ottawa                                                                                                                                                      [email protected]                                                                                                                                                            343-552-0202

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Latest posts

Deputation at Community Services Committee
Budget 2024

Hear our Executive Director Kaite Burkholder Harris share long-term solutions to Ottawa's housing crisis at the Community Services Committee.

Tuesday, Nov 28th - Community Services Committee - Budget 2024

 Good Morning Chair and Members of the Committee,

Over the course of the past year, as the City faces the full impact of a housing crisis out of control, I want to start by pointing to actions that are working. In June, this Council approved an Integrated Transition to Housing Plan that City staff built with community partners. The result in the short term is an enhanced rent subsidy with greater flexibility, enabling people who have been stuck in homelessness to rapidly move out of the PDC’s. By allocating resources towards flexible subsidies like this, we enable people to secure stable housing.

Ending Homelessness Starts With Non-Profit Housing

By: Sophia Kelly-Langer

Take a moment to picture a person experiencing a housing crisis. What does it look like? For some, it looks like sitting out in the cold, hoping that the shelter is not full, so they can actually get in that night. For others, it looks like a family struggling to make the rent after a lay-off. It may look like a senior on a fixed income unable to downsize in their neighbourhood because there are no affordable options.

 

In the most extreme cases, a housing crisis looks like people living in encampments, some directly in front of Parliament Hill. These have become the only shelter options for some, including children and youth under bridges. The jarring contrast of the most vulnerable going without the basic need of housing just feet away from our country’s decision-makers is not lost on the people living in an encampment.

Increase Investment in Non-Profit Housing: Deputation to the Planning & Housing Committee, February 15th 2023

The fallout from the housing crisis means that as a city, we spend $30 million on emergency shelter costs every year. People experiencing homelessness engaging with police costs roughly $25M every year in Ottawa. We spend over $15 million a year on keeping people in hotels, because there is not enough affordable housing. Ending the housing crisis in our city means that we invest at least as much in solutions, as we do managing the crisis.

In order to make our city affordable, the smartest capital investment we can make is in non-profit housing.

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  • KB
    Kaite Burkholder Harris
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    published this page in Blog 2022-04-19 10:42:59 -0400

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