Canada’s is experiencing an unprecedented wave of new homelessness driven by the high cost of rent, low vacancy rates and a lack of affordable housing options. Well over 263,000 Canadians will experience homelessness this year alone.
To that end, today we join REALPAC and the Smart Prosperity Institute to release: The National Housing Accord: A Multi-Sector Approach to Ending Canada’s Rental Housing Crisis.
The National Housing Accord’s recommendations provide the blueprint to build over 2 million units of purpose-built rental housing including over 655,000 units of near-market and deeply affordable housing and allows us to take immediate action to stop the wave of new homelessness we are experiencing with a Homelessness Prevention and Housing Benefit.
Recommendations in the National Housing Accord include:
• Creating a Homelessness Prevention and Housing Benefit to provide immediate support for people at risk of homelessness;
• Federal funding for deeply affordable housing, co-operative housing, and supportive housing, along with seniors’ housing and student residences, and doubling the relative share of non-market community housing;
• Reforming the National Building Code;
• Eliminating the GST/HST and changing capital cost allowance provisions on new purpose-built rental housing to incentivize construction;
• Creating property acquisition programs for non-profit housing providers to help purchase existing rental housing projects and hotels, and facilitate office-to-residential conversions;
• Reforming the Canada Housing Benefit to better support individuals and families with the greatest housing needs; and
• Providing low-cost, long-term fixed-rate financing for constructing and upgrading purpose-built rental housing.
Read the full report on the website here.
The Accord is an offer from non-profit and for-profit housing providers, developers, and investors to work with the federal government to build an affordable and healthy rental housing system that achieves the government’s vision of affordable and adequate housing for all.
Our rental housing crisis is solvable. The National Housing Accord lays out a path forward but the federal government must step into their leadership role to make it happen.
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Thank you for your support!
Tim Richter
President & CEO
Canadian Alliance to End Homelessness
