All Hands on Deck for Housing
At some recent events we’ve had the privilege of attending, including the Bracebridge Rotary Club lunch and the RTO12/Explorer’s Edge Regional Tourism Summit, we were struck by how many different people and organizations across Muskoka are working on affordable housing. The work these organizations are putting into local solutions and innovative partnerships is testament to the level of collaboration that’s possible, and we’re excited to participate.
CMHC estimates that Canada needs 5.8 million total homes built by 2030 to restore affordability, and as Mike Moffat, Founding Director of the PLACE Centre and co-author of the National Housing Accord writes,
We are in a crisis, and a war-time-like effort is needed. The federal government must prioritize speed and act now.
Mike Moffatt, The HUB Viewpoint, August 2023
In Muskoka, there is an estimated 2,755 homes needed to fix the 2021 housing deficit, and with the population expected to grow by 27% by 2046, we need to build homes more rapidly than our current rate of approximately 366 permanent homes per year.
Source: Core Housing Need by Income, Housing Assessment Resource Tools (HART), 2021 census data
“Core housing need” measures whether a household experiences problems related to one or all of the following characteristics:
Affordability: Paying more than 30% of income on shelter costs
Suitability: Not enough space for the size of the household
Adequacy: Housing is not in good repair
When we look even closer at the Muskoka households in core housing need, we see that housing is about more than the numbers of homes that need to be built, it’s about addressing the inequities built into our current approach:
When single mothers, Indigenous people and families, visible minorities, seniors, refugees, and people with physical, cognitive, mental, or addictions activity limitations are the ones without access to stable, secure, adequate, and affordable housing, everyone in the community suffers because of that injustice.
We know from workshops like Bridges out of Poverty that the mental load of unstable, inadequate housing eats up an overwhelming amount of cognitive capacity. Imagine what our communities could look like if everyone had adequate, suitable, affordable housing, and their mental energy was freed up, available for volunteering with one of the many active service organizations in Muskoka, creating art, and starting new businesses.
Imagine the tremendous diversity of thought our community could benefit from?
That’s the kind of Muskoka we need all hands on deck to build.