80 per cent of food bank users spend half of income on rent

‘Dramatic increase’ comes as city eyes $50M poverty investment

An inflated housing market and rising rents are creating a growing reliance on food banks, leaving Hamiltonians on the brink of homelessness, poverty activists warn.

According to Hamilton Food Share — a not-for-profit umbrella organization that represents 11 food banks across the city — a growing number of people are having to budget half or more of their monthly income toward rent.

A reported 80 per cent of Hamilton’s roughly 20,000 food bank users were in that boat as of February, compared to 49 per cent of users just one year ago.

“It is a very dramatic increase, and in just 11 months,” Joanne Santucci, executive director of Hamilton Food Share, said Tuesday.

“There are all kinds of transitions happening in our community right now, and some people are falling through the cracks.”

This increase is particularly alarming when you consider that the Canadian mortgage and Housing Corporation defines anyone who pays more than 50 per cent of income on rent as being at “extreme risk of homelessness.”

Santucci notes the irony that these latest figures represent about 6,000 households in the community that are living on this precipice of homelessness — roughly the same number of people who are on the waiting list for affordable housing.

The city’s housing shortage is a focus of a $50-million poverty reduction investment plan set to be presented to councillors Wednesday, just one day after a national poverty conference was held at Hamilton’s convention centre.

Among other things, it calls for the renovation of 200 public housing units across the city. It would also allot $10 million for indigenous community-led supports. The funds would be from the city’s Future Fund and dividends from the newly merged hydro utility.

Santucci says there is an urgent need. Because of the wait-list, only 25 per cent of local food bank users are reportedly in subsidized housing, the Food Share numbers show. The other three-quarters are paying market rent.

And despite talk of Hamilton as a “cheap” alternative to Toronto, market rent is becoming unaffordable for many people, says Tom Cooper, executive director of the Hamilton Roundtable for Poverty Reduction. “If you look on Kijiji or any of the other real estate ad sites, it’s virtually impossible to find a one-bedroom apartment for under $1,000. And certainly a two-bedroom unit, if you have a larger family, (you can’t find) under $1,2001,300,” Cooper said.

“That is hugely cutting into people’s available income to buy other essentials of life, like food. That’s why we’re seeing more and more people going to food banks. They are having to make that dark choice between paying the rent or feeding the kids — and that’s very much the reality for Hamiltonians experiencing poverty right now.”

Deirdre Pike, co-ordinator of the Women’s Housing Planning Collaborative, cites a recent study by the Social Planning and Research Council of Hamilton that states one in five children lives in poverty.

“Well, those children do not live by themselves,” Pike said. “We know that food banks are, for sure, heavily dominated by female users and their families.”