“Homelessness & Affordability Crisis”

Menace, addiction and human despair have overwhelmed small towns and cities. Some say it’s getting worse. Some just want to leave.

ST. CATHARINES, Ont. — Gigi and Nick are stoking a fire on the right bank of Twelve Mile Creek. It is the sunset hour in St. Catharines, Ont., but the atmosphere is damp and heavy from a November morning rain.

There is not another soul in sight, down here in the riverside parklands below a street called Gale Crescent, a few blocks east of downtown. For kindling, Gigi has scavenged an armful of twigs from the municipal shrubbery. She stacks it inside a makeshift hearth of flagstones and tries to get it to catch, but the twigs are wet and will not accept the flame from Nick’s pocket lighter.

TORONTO – The mayors of Ontario’s 29 largest cities are calling on the province to declare a state of emergency as municipalities deal with what they call a “community safety and humanitarian crisis” created by homelessness, mental health and addiction.

Ontario Big City Mayors urged the province to provide more funding and engage more actively with cities and other stakeholders in a motion passed unanimously on Friday.

The mayors caucus says municipalities covered more than 50 per cent of the $4.1 billion spent on homelessness and housing programs in 2024.

Spending on housing programs will decline by more than half over the next four years with the federal government’s $13-billion signature housing initiative leading to the construction of just 26,000 new homes, a new parliamentary budget officer (PBO) report says.

The budget watchdog’s report specifically looks at Prime Minister Mark Carney’s new housing agency, Build Canada Homes, and how it and other programs will contribute to the construction of new homes between now and 2029-30.

The report concludes that the $9.8 billion the federal government is spending on housing initiatives in 2025-26 will decline to just $4.3 billion annually by 2028-29, a drop of 56 per cent.

h/t Mauser

Andrea Griffith thought an annual income of $200,000 would be enough.

Enough to stay in Toronto, enough to buy a modest home and enough to build a stable life with her partner and new young daughter.

Only one problem — it wasn’t.

Unspoken is the White Flight from Toronto’s vibrant diversity.

House prices in Toronto are declining. But the city’s affordability crisis is far from over — and government policies will likely make it worse.

While most Torontonians know there’s a crisis, the numbers make it clear. According to our new study, in 2023 (the latest year of available data), a family earning the city’s median after-tax income ($60,510) had to save $216,240 (the equivalent of 42.9 months of its after-tax income) for a 20% down payment on a typical home of any type (single-detached, semi-detached, condominium). But even if that family could somehow clear this monumental hurdle, it then had to dedicate 110.2% of its after-tax income for monthly mortgage payments ($5,557) — a financial impossibility, unless the family can share housing costs (e.g. live-in tenants) or rely on financial support from elsewhere.

A recently announced funding opportunity for homelessness programs from the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development would reward communities that commit to public safety—including those that comply with the Sex Offender Registry and Notification Act. At first glance, this may seem like an unusual concern for homelessness policy. But it relates directly to a growing concern among policymakers about a strong link between sex offenses and homelessness—one that activists have attempted to obscure.

For years, a vocal minority of social activists have effectively dictated public policy in Canadian cities. Homeless encampments in parks and beside playgrounds have not simply been tolerated, but recharacterized as legitimate neighbourhoods to be protected. Indeed, drive around Toronto and you’ll see signs that read “I support my neighbours in tents” outside million-dollar homes, where the families who sleep inside ostensibly have private backyards to enjoy. (Lower-income families without backyards, by contrast, actually have to share public outdoor spaces with those “neighbours in tents.”)

Nothing corrodes political credibility faster than pretending a problem doesn’t exist. Especially when that problem is one that voters feel in their bones. And nothing angers voters more — or accelerates their distrust — than denying the reality that life is getting more expensive.

You can stall, spin, or distract from this fact. But eventually, the bills come due.

Last week offered two striking examples of just that.