Cash for homeless projects moving soon

$500M in federal funding will go to large cities

OTTAWA — Fifteen cities will share $500 million in federal funding so they can buy properties being sold because of the COVID-19 pandemic and use them to help keep people from becoming homeless.

Canada’s biggest city, Toronto, will get the largest slice of that funding pie with about $203 million, with funding also going to Vancouver, Montreal, Ottawa and Edmonton to help their housing providers find places for people in time for winter.

A further $500 million will be up for grabs for projects that will have to be completed within 12 months of federal officials giving the green light for funding. The money up for grabs is in high demand, with some cities already laying out buying strategies and prepping to apply for the project-based funding stream.

Edmonton Mayor Don Iveson said once those applications are in, cities will be telling the federal Liberals that both pots of money will need to be topped up.

“But the best way to make that argument is to use up the two $500-million allocations quickly, which we intend to do,” said Iveson, who chairs the big-city mayors group of the Federation of Canadian Municipalities.

The government considered the program for months as a way to keep people from falling into homelessness heading into the winter.

Some cities have rented hotel rooms to accommodate people while shelter capacity is reduced to allow for physical spacing, but they ’re badly stretched financially.

Toronto Mayor John Tory said in a statement his city needed to pool the money with municipal funds as well as dollars from the private and nonprofit sectors “to get affordable housing built as quickly as possible in our city.” He added that work is underway on a 12month plan to properly put the funding to work.