Introduction
A global housing crisis is occurring in full force. Many kinds of urban environments are experiencing disproportionate homelessness due to the lack of affordable housing, which has been exacerbated by COVID-19. Major metropolitan cities are experiencing the highest housing costs in history, making this issue especially relevant within these areas. This briefing will focus on the city of Toronto, Canada, in exploring issues of housing and homelessness. A call to action is targeted at municipal, provincial, and federal governments together to reverse the effects of structural inequities in housing markets and take short-term and long-term projects seriously in addressing the crisis.
This report seeks to inform these groups on the crisis from the ground level, using stakeholder perspectives and case study analyses to create a comprehensive picture of homelessness in Toronto. The ending of the pandemic presents a unique opportunity for governments and private funders to reevaluate their profiles and redirect funds to new beneficiaries, and it therefore must be capitalized on. The scope of this briefing includes the Greater Toronto Area, focusing on the downtown core and programs within it. The history of homelessness and the housing crisis is observed to contextualize contemporary approaches, and recommendations presented consider possibilities for both the present and coming decades. Personal bias is considered in a statement on positionality to offer a reflexive body of work. This briefing seeks to contribute to the global crisis and the existing body of literature through an analysis of this major city, providing reflections and recommendations that may apply to a wider context.
Background and History
The current population of Toronto is 3,025,647, with its metro region accommodating 6,471,850 people (City of Toronto, 2023). These statistics have placed Toronto as one of the top five largest cities in North America. Alongside the population growth rests a complex history of (in)access to affordable housing, and associated homelessness. The current average price of all home types in Toronto is 1,140,647 Canadian Dollars. Accordingly, there were 84,583 individuals on the centralized waiting list for social housing in the spring of 2023, with an average time of 13 years spent on waiting lists (City of Toronto, 2023).
The recent history of the housing crisis can be traced to the 1980s when the term ‘homelessness’ underwent a conceptual change, previously thought of as males residing in certain areas, and displaying certain characteristics (Barker, 1977). It wasn’t until an extreme lack of housing in the 1980s that the term was redefined as those un-housed (Baumohl, 1996). It was a global social problem; no longer was the UN’s “Year of Shelter for the Homeless” reserved for the global south (Greene, 2014). The crisis was predominantly blamed on urban restructuring, encompassing gentrification, neo-liberal welfare state reform, economic and occupational change, and urban entrepreneurialism (Greene, 2014).
The crisis was not addressed until increased visibility of the homeless population; a movement was catalyzed by the passing of a homeless woman found frozen to death in December 1985 (Snarr and Jasper, 2000). Nonetheless, cuts to social assistance continued, prompting participation and creation of several community groups. The collapse of the Toronto real estate market in 1989 accelerated negative effects of post-Fordist urban development, enabling more neo-liberalization in governance (Greene, 2014). The number of deaths in the streets of Toronto increased dramatically, along with the number of individuals staying in homeless shelters each
night. The City Council finally labeled homelessness a “national disaster” in 1998. However, the label was more powerful in theory than practice; its effectiveness was drowned out by municipal mismanagement (Greene, 2014), leaving the issue to community programs and initiatives.
Toronto is recognized as one of the most multicultural cities in the world. Immigration makes up a large sum of this; 51.2% of the population was born outside of Canada. This demographic may experience increased disadvantage when seeking housing. Difficulties can be exacerbated by language barriers, insufficient and inaccurate information, discriminatory practices by landlords, neighbors, and others, and an unawareness of rights and responsibilities as tenants or renters (Halliday and Teixeira, 2010). Indigenous groups similarly face discrimination in housing markets. This can be traced back to historical strategies to eliminate Indigenous Peoples; Canada’s history of colonization and exploitation of Indigenous land and populations has had lasting effects, continuing into present-day governing policies.
Central to understanding Toronto’s homelessness emergency is the impact of COVID-19. Toronto is considered to have experienced the longest lockdown of any city in the world (Cathcart-Keays, 2022). With the ongoing emergent state of unaffordable housing and homelessness, the pandemic exacerbated distress. In complying with public health directives, many shelters and services had limited capacities or closed altogether. People experiencing homelessness were hence more vulnerable to infection due to the lack of safe housing. On top of that, in the absence of regular services, they faced increased risks related to intimate partner violence and unsafe substance use, highlighting the importance of housing as a social detriment of health (Perri, Dosani, and Hwand, 2020). Like other major metropolitan cities, in April 2020, Toronto leased 1,200 hotel rooms to assist the shelter system. A factor that triggered this response was the increased visibility of street homelessness, like that of the 1980s when the crisis became inescapable. Nevertheless, the city is more aware of homelessness than ever (Cathcart- Keays, 2022), making it an important time to review and re-evaluate current approaches to affordable housing in Toronto.
Positionality
In approaching this subject, it must be recognized that I have not had any firsthand experience with housing insecurity. Furthermore, as a member of a Caucasian Canadian family having lived in Toronto for generations, I have not been subject to the inequities and discrimination that some individuals have faced in the housing market. My experience with the homeless community in Toronto is from a removed standpoint, however, from a young age, I have been aware of the crisis, thinking back fondly to the man who sat outside of a grocery store by my elementary school and became a friend of many students. For this briefing, I have grounded my knowledge in academic journals, news articles, and interviews with key stakeholders such as people experiencing homelessness themselves. This was done to minimize bias and reflect a comprehensive understanding of the crisis. However, bias is inevitable, and I will therefore remain dedicated to transparency in my work to ensure a high level of integrity. This is especially critical in my recommendations section, as it is dangerous to speak for a community that one is far removed from, which is why a key component of my approach is community participation and government transparency.
Policy and Legal Framework
The housing crisis stems from a range of interconnected policy decisions at municipal, provincial, and federal levels framed around neoliberal ideologies. This shaped socioeconomic transformations across Canada in the 1990s, following cuts to federal social assistance in the 1980s, feeding the crisis. The Canadian government canceled its National Housing Strategy in 1993, with a turn to market forces to solve the problem (Gaetz, 2013). The conservative government continued to cut other benefits for those living in poverty, disproportionately affecting people experiencing homelessness.
The current legal framework focuses on emergency mechanisms, such as emergency shelters, which disregard the permanence of homelessness for many Torontonians trapped in a vicious cycle. Homelessness has consequently become more visible, acting as a source of mobilization for community initiatives. However, the policy response focuses on punitive justice, criminalizing homelessness, outlawing begging, and restricting the use of public spaces (Gaetz, 2013). Within the shelter system, though, the City of Toronto has in place the Toronto Shelter Standards, ensuring just living conditions including social environments, most recently updated in 2022. The city council has also extended the openings of emergency shelters, such as the example of lowering the threshold for opening warming centers in the cold winter months (Draaisma, 2023). Although emergency shelter mechanisms may be effective in the Toronto case, this must couple with affordable housing policies and recognition of transitional phases of homeless individuals to make a meaningful impact.
A dominant policy plan in place is the Housing TO 2020-2030 Action Plan, created by the City of Toronto, published in 2018. This blueprint outlines actions across the housing spectrum from homelessness to housing rentals and ownership. This master plan guides many others within it and calls groups to action in reaching various indicators. Reports in 2021 recognized great progress towards the Housing TO plan but pointed out that enhanced federal and provincial investments are key to ensuring continued success. Fluid communication between these three levels of government must be incorporated into present and future action plans to support their shared objectives in conquering the homelessness and affordable housing crisis, and therefore this briefing is targeted towards this collective.
Community Initiatives and Programmes
Community involvement is central to Toronto’s history of battling homelessness. A large part of this involvement has taken the form of activism and protests. A notable example is from the 1999 Toronto International Film Festival, where the Ontario Coalition Against Poverty (OCAP) panhandled guests and chanted about the homelessness crisis, forcing Hollywood stars to use a back door. This was only one part of their fall Campaign for Economic Disruption, calling attention to the invisibility of homelessness (Greene, 2014). Theirs was a more visible, radical approach, but other community programs that work to support people experiencing homelessness every day may go unnoticed in the city.
Toronto’s Shelter Support and Housing Administration (SSHA) is the city’s division that manages homeless services in Toronto, following a Housing First and human rights approach, working closely with over 200 community service providers (City of Toronto, 2021). Community service providers in Toronto support general homelessness, but some are also geared toward more specific groups. Street to Homes (S2H), for example, supports people experiencing homelessness through street outreach 24 hours, seven days a week. They also connect individuals with housing-related follow-up support and work with other city-funded partners to broaden their reach (City of Toronto, 2021). The United Way Greater Toronto similarly supports best practices in addressing homelessness. They focus on preventing and reducing the occurrence and duration of homelessness through early intervention. This group calls for a regional approach, emphasizing the importance of this greater network (United Way Greater Toronto, n.d.). These wide-reaching programs are supported by others with more niche targets.
COSTI Immigrant Services works with the United Way in supporting settlement and citizenship services for those new to Canada. This is especially important for newcomer women at risk of or facing intimate partner violence. Another community group is the 519, working with LGBTQ2S individuals among others, to create a safe and accessible environment. This group rose out of a Toronto study which found that 20% of youth in the shelter system identify as LGBTQ2S (Homeless Hub, n.d.).
Case Study: Fred Victor Organization
Fred Victor is a charity organization providing social services across Toronto. They run two emergency shelters open 24 hours a day, seven days a week, which provide laundry and hygiene supplies, in addition to information, referral, and supported housing access and advocacy. They also offer affordable and transitional housing for individuals and families, including services for women transitioning to the housing market. Their focus on community impacts helps people find sustainable employment (Fred Victor, n.d.). This dual focus, which incorporates the Housing First approach, supports both immediate needs of people with emergency shelters, while also providing affordable housing, and facilitating the transition between the two. Fred Victor received 5.4 million CAD in donations and 38.1 million in government funding in 2023. Fred Victor published a 2019-2024 Strategic plan in which they outlined goals and their associated indicators. A review in 2022 checked in with the indicators that were to be met by the fall of that year where it was established that they were on target for 21 out of 26 indicators (Fred Victor, 2022).
A shock to the existing system was COVID-19, dramatically exacerbating the needs of communities. Nonetheless, Fred Victor persevered. Throughout the pandemic, emergency shelters remained safely open. In March 2021, the women’s shelter moved into a newly renovated building. Fred Victor also worked with the City of Toronto in repurposing the Edward Village Hotel in North York into a safe shelter. They continued meal services, adapting and growing to meet increased demands, and developed an enhanced PPE policy and screening protocol. They were also among the first to host COVID-19 testing sites, and later, vaccine pop- up clinics (Fred Victor, 2021).
Fred Victor, as a four-star-rated charity, has an above-average result reporting grade, low overhead costs, and is financially transparent. In 2023, they have helped 263 people secure housing, helping 174 individuals move from transitional to permanent housing, and 176 more from shelters into permanent housing. Their safe injection sites have helped to reverse 460 overdoses, and they have diverted 652 people from the criminal justice system to mental health
services (Charity Intelligence Canada, n.d.), actively putting a wrench in the vicious cycle of homelessness.
Stakeholder Perspectives
In a 2019 interview with CBC News, individuals weighed in on their experiences with homelessness. Paul, 43, who was homeless for 6 years at the time from hurting his back and losing his job, explained that “You have nothing, [be]cause people think you’re nothing, you end up thinking you’re nothing.” The psychological side, and the social stigma around homelessness, are outlined here as a barrier to success. Paul also explained that there are “… so many types of homelessness in this city…it’s not just the bums you see on the street, we’re everywhere now,” highlighting the sense of invisibility. At the time, Paul was on an 11-year waiting list for housing, “for a white male 43 years old,” suggesting that it can only be harder for others due to racial injustices. Another individual named Kevin explained that he wants the city to create more shelter beds. Kevin says “It boils down to real humanity. We know what to do, we’re just not doing it. We’ve got to start caring about people” (CBC News, 2019). Shelters were supposed to be temporary, emergency solutions, but as demonstrated here, individuals have been living in them for years, highlighting a systemic issue.
Many people who have been supporting community initiatives are fed up with inaction from the city. Cathy Crowe, a street nurse in Toronto, has worked with people living in poverty for over three decades. Cathy reiterated Kevin’s statement, exclaiming that “we have all been saying, for years through the pandemic, what needs to be done…but in the last six months, politicians and medical officers of health will not touch the recommendations that need to happen,” in referencing continued health measures around the end of the pandemic, and in stopping bill 124 which caps public workers’ salaries. Cathy claimed that “There needs to be a wartime effort to house people,” because “The conditions are literally catastrophic.”
At a political level, federal NDP leader Jagmeet Singh pushed Prime Minister Justin Trudeau to assist mayor-elect Olivia Chow in July 2023 in solving the city’s affordable housing issue, asking him to re-evaluate federal taxes and use any vacant federal land for affordable housing (City News, 2023). The city itself has declared homelessness an emergency at the Federal level, signaling this need for a strong partnership. The City Council decided to ask provincial and federal governments to add 20 million CAD to the Canada-Ontario Housing Benefit (COHB) in 2023-2024 to support permanent housing.
Challenges and Barriers
There are a range of barriers to ending homelessness and creating affordable housing, which is why so many major cities struggle. Toronto faces complex social, economic, demographic, and governmental barriers. Social stigma against affordable housing and renters is a big player here. Many people present a not in my backyard syndrome, fearing that affordable rental housing will increase crime and decrease property value (Fung, Parikh, and Zulauf, 2020). People experiencing homelessness feel the effects of this stigma, as was explained by Paul in the previous section, taking a psychological toll.
Some perceived economic barriers are socially constructed as well. Many people believe that providing shelters and services is too expensive when the truth is that subsidizing social housing is a more economical approach. The monthly cost of a shelter bed and services in Toronto in recent years was 2,250 CAD, whereas the monthly cost of subsidizing a unit of Toronto’s social housing was 306 CAD. Nevertheless, true economic barriers remain. Affordable housing is rented or sold at below-market value, making it difficult without government investors (Habitat for Humanity, 2018). Additionally, government tax policies add massively to the costs of development, and uncertainties of long-term government commitments create risk (Habitat for Humanity, 2018). Additional barriers in government practices, as previously established, lie in municipal, provincial, and federal disconnects. In terms of demographics, the province has reportedly been behind on the housing supply because of labor shortages, making development especially difficult. This poses difficulties with the influx of newcomers expected to arrive in the present and future (Balintec, 2023).
Recommendations
An action plan must consider both immediate and long-term strategies for reducing homelessness and creating affordable housing. There are serval keys to success that must remain present in all developments. First is transparency with data and the measuring process to enable community involvement. The second is to address the stigma around homelessness and affordable housing units. Third, and has underlined much of this briefing, is fluid communication and partnership between all levels of government. These elements are simplified for this report but are key to the following actionable recommendations.
In the short term, the city and community partners must continue with the Housing First initiative, prioritizing housing as a human right. This initiative is already at play in both community and government programs and must continue to be enforced, such as employed by Fred Victor. This can be facilitated through government-funded community outreach programs and the creation of more emergency shelters. However, emergency shelters must be supplemented with permanent housing to fulfill their short-term purpose. A short-term permanent affordable housing project to be implemented is the mass production of modular homes. These homes bring project costs down while speeding up development and completion (Balintec, 2023). Construction company BECC Modular is a great partner for this project.
Another approach, discussed by the Wellesley Institutes Blueprint to End Homelessness in Toronto, is to immediately move up to half of the sheltered individuals into permanent homes through enhanced rent supplements, as funding for shelter beds is much more expensive than rent supplements in Toronto (Wellesley Institute, 2011). With less strain on shelters, they can better perform their emergency function.
Longer-term approaches are essential to the sustained housing of individuals across the city. The funding of new and renovated homes in mixed-income neighborhoods can be enabled by increased provincial and federal funding. Inclusionary zoning policies requiring new developments to include affordable housing units is another promising approach, as was successful in the Vienna housing model, destigmatizing and decommodifying affordable housing (Fung, Parikh, and Zulauf, 2020). The government must also activate surplus public land, as suggested by Jagmeet Singh in July 2023, using this vacant land in Toronto to build affordable homes (City News, 2023). An innovative approach for Toronto, which has been gaining traction in recent years, is laneway housing. Toronto uniquely has a network of almost 2,400 laneways stretching 300km through some of Toronto’s most sought-after neighborhoods (Lanescape, 2017). This untapped resource may prove extremely promising but must follow a participatory approach, working together with current neighborhood residents. Creating more productive housing means prioritizing a humanitarian, intersectional, and inclusive approach. A large part of this is advancing reconciliation with indigenous peoples by creating culturally appropriate shelters and housing units, on top of addressing anti-black racism.
Conclusion
This briefing has explored homelessness and issues with affordable housing in Toronto, calling various levels of government to take action in improving the existing emergency shelter system and long-term affordable housing solutions. Urban restructuring in Toronto’s history along with racial discrimination has left structural inequities that must be addressed. Legal frameworks have been assessed, exposing the history of cuts to social funding and the criminalization of homelessness, but recognized the just Toronto Shelter Standards in place. Activism and community initiatives have played a critical role in supporting people experiencing homelessness, assessed through a case study of the Fred Victor organization which sets an example for others and employs elements further emphasized in the recommendations section. A stakeholder analysis of people experiencing homelessness, community program members, politicians, and the City of Toronto is compiled to consider a range of opinions and ideas on the matter. Social, economic, governmental, and demographic barriers are evaluated followed by a list of both short-term and long-term recommendations. These are namely the importance of Housing First initiatives and modular housing, alongside newly renovated affordable housing through activation of surplus public land and inclusionary zoning, and the possibility of laneway housing. This is underscored by the need for transparency in data and measurement, education around the stigmas of homelessness and affordable housing, and a nexus of government involvement and interaction at all stages of the process.
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