Posts Tagged ‘homelessness’

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The toll of police work

Monday, October 24th, 2022

Due to tears in the social safety net, many vulnerable people fall through the cracks, and it then falls to police to pick them up. Police therefore become, by default, de facto doctors, nurses and social workers, as they have to deal with issues for which they’re neither qualified nor equipped: homelessness, addictions and mental illness. This adds enormously to operational stress — and to trauma — for overpoliced, vulnerable people who need care, not cops.

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Posted in Child & Family Delivery System | No Comments »


Tackling the opioid crisis

Tuesday, October 11th, 2022

… statistics point us to two solutions: First, we need to regulate, rather than criminalize, all psychoactive drugs, and second, we ought to provide a safe supply of drugs to users. Those two solutions were, respectively, the “core” and “urgent” priorities identified by an expert task force last year, but so far, Ottawa has done relatively little toward making them a reality.

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Posted in Health Policy Context | No Comments »


Profit and affordable housing don’t mix. Period

Sunday, May 22nd, 2022

Canada has a long tradition of governments at all levels providing affordable housing. Absent a profit motive, they can, as they once did, provide decent homes at reasonable prices and rents… The profit motive has its place in our mixed economy. But it has failed us in the provision of affordable housing. Housing will not be a human right until we accompany that noble sentiment with an abundance of affordable shelter.

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Raising the incomes of the poorest Ontarians

Friday, May 6th, 2022

While the cost of living is going up dramatically, Ontario Works and ODSP rates have been frozen since 2018… more than 843,000 Ontarians are living in deep poverty. / Ontario is in the midst of an affordable housing crisis. / … precarious working conditions… the minimum wage well below the living wage. / Long-term care residents have suffered more than almost any other group in our province during the pandemic.

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Posted in Governance Debates | No Comments »


We can’t simply build our way out of our housing crisis

Friday, April 29th, 2022

More new housing will help if it’s the kind of housing that is currently lacking, built for the people who need it most. Various studies indicate that 40 to 50 per cent of people in Canada are living paycheque-to-paycheque. That is, nearly half the population of this prosperous country are income insecure. Plans for new housing must prioritize these people.

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Housing co-ops could solve Canada’s housing affordability crisis

Wednesday, April 20th, 2022

TheConversation.com April 19, 2022.   Margaret Kohn The housing affordability crisis seems impossible to solve. Policies intended to help people priced out of the market often serve to fan the flames and increase costs. An example is tax-free down payment plans like the one just announced in the federal 2022 budget, which can drive up prices by […]

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50 years, 50 moments (part 2)

Thursday, April 7th, 2022

… we’ve compiled 50 milestones that together create a snapshot of a fast-growing sector moving into maturity, developing a clearer idea of itself and its role in Canadian society, navigating turbulent and often adversarial relationships with government, fighting for the funds and licence to fully come into its own, and able to fuel progressive shifts in spite of significant obstacles.

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Posted in Inclusion History | No Comments »


Ontario’s ‘affordable housing’ task force report does not address the real problems

Friday, February 11th, 2022

… the report reads like a blueprint for how to build more market-rate housing. Unfortunately, there is little empirical evidence to indicate that on its own, market-driven upzoning, laneway housing or mixed-use zoning produces the kind of housing that is accessible to households on low and moderate incomes… We talk a lot about housing today… because it has now become a middle-class problem.

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Posted in Inclusion Debates | 1 Comment »


Ontario’s ‘affordable housing’ task force report does not address the real problems

Friday, February 11th, 2022

The tasks force’s recommendations are squarely aimed at this middle-class interpretation of the housing crisis… these measures will do very little for those on low and moderate incomes… Instead, a range of policies are needed to curb speculation, increase the supply of non-market, genuinely affordable housing and ensure tenants have adequate protections through strong rent-control policies.

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As Toronto’s homeless freeze, modular housing for them sits empty in a city parking lot. Blame Doug Ford’s government

Thursday, February 10th, 2022

The city asked for a special minister’s order to fast track modular housing for the homeless in Willowdale. The province has refused… The modular housing units sit empty near Finch Station, a five-minute drive from their intended destination… the… government’s new report on housing affordability recommends limiting exactly that: the seemingly endless community consultations that stall new housing in cities. 

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