“Homelessness & Affordability Crisis”

When I moved to London for the second time in my life, in the early 2000s, I was struck by a highly visible change: The street-level misery that had defined the great metropolis in the 1980s had all but vanished. Gone were the bodies huddled under blankets around the edges of Trafalgar Square, the rows of beggars along Oxford Street and the Strand, the encampments beneath the arches of Waterloo Bridge.

It was the first and only time I have seen a serious urban “rough sleeping” problem (as street homelessness is more accurately known in Britain) more or less fully solved, humanely and comprehensively.

Numbers seem to be in dispute … 

This article quotes numbers from a homeless advocacy group so bias is possible, even likely – The London-only Combined Homelessness and Information Network (Chain) figures are considered to be more accurate than the official one-night count. The most recent annual count showed 10,053 rough sleepers were spotted on London’s streets between April 2022 and March 2023. That was down by a fifth on the 8,329 recorded in the previous year.

This is from the BBC – London has had the biggest rise of rough sleepers in England according to government figures, with an increase of 34% across a 12-month period.

There were an estimated 858 people sleeping rough in the capital on a single night in autumn 2022, compared to 640 the year before.

The BBC numbers seem light.

… The jump in Vancouver home prices, combined with higher interest rates and stress tests, means that a buyer would need an annual income of $235,650 to buy a home in Metro Vancouver last month, up from $226,800 in May.

Vancouver’s average home price increase was more than double the rate of the next two cities: Toronto was up $6,900 to an average home price of $1,171,300, and Victoria was up $6,500 to $885,100.

During my recent run to become mayor of Toronto, one line I heard from a lot of people was that they were considering moving out of town if Olivia Chow won the election. The challenges on our streets have become so dire on a number of fronts—crime, affordability, gridlock—that an exodus from the cities is becoming more likely.

We’ll see how many people make good on their threat following Chow’s victory. These sorts of sentiments have become common, such as how American progressive celebrities pledged to move to Canada if Donald Trump won the presidency.

There is so much wrong with America’s cities, it’s hard to see why any contributing member of society would live and/or work in one of them. Some of the issues arise from far-Left local governance while others are generated by more widespread Leftist policy. These are coupled with an organic workforce evolution, as the United States transitions from an industry-based to an information-based economy. The result is urban areas caught in a downward spiral — and, as with any sinking vessel, threatening to suck everyone nearby down with them.

Striking tenants who are refusing to pay big rent increases in several buildings in Toronto’s west end say they’ve been flooded with support from across the country.

York South-Weston Tenant Union organizer Bruno Dobrusin said support for their rent strike has been “overwhelming.” Not only are people paying attention, but he said they’re interested in learning how to organize themselves.

“It’s a hopeful sign that people are rising up and fighting back,” said Dobrusin.

I suspect any such populist movement would be compromised by hardcore communists in about a minute.

Outreach worker helping library grapple with concerning incidents

Since the city hired a community outreach worker for the Orillia Public Library last fall, the number of concerning incidents has dropped dramatically and library staff have a newfound sense of ease carrying out their work, officials say.

The position was approved last year by city council to address ongoing social issues at the library and in the downtown core — whether related to homelessness, mental health, addictions, or other issues — which staff were unequipped to address and often prompted the need to call the OPP.

h/t Sweetpea

A growing number of Canadian couples and singles live in homes with vacant bedrooms, a phenomenon that is coming to light as local governments across the country grapple with acute housing needs.

The percentage of singles and couples who live in homes that have a minimum of three bedrooms increased to 29 per cent in Canada in 2021, according to an analysis by The Globe and Mail of census numbers for that year. That compares with 26 per cent in 2006, according to the corresponding census.

It’s camping season in Canada — but not in the usual sense. From Penticton to Prince Edward Island, urban landscapes have become dotted with tent cities. Homeless encampments have been “visibly rising” according to the Canadian Human Rights Commission. Statistics Canada reports that on a given night, 25,000 to 35,000 people may be experiencing homelessness, and more than 235,000 people are homeless during a given year. According to a report by the Office of the Federal Housing Advocate, at least one encampment has been set up in a majority of Canada’s 25 largest municipalities since the COVID-19 pandemic started in March 2020.

Not gonna happen in Chowtown.

In London, Ont., a city of about half a million people, hundreds are sleeping rough each night, many of them clustered in tents along the Thames River.

In Charlottetown, a 50-bed shelter opened in January, doubling the island’s total shelter capacity – but it’s still not enough, with the most recent end-of-year count identifying at least 114 people experiencing homelessness in the city.

MONTREAL – Rooming or boarding houses are regaining favour with some Canadian cities as a way to offset a lack of affordable homes, but experts warn there are pitfalls to the once-popular form of urban housing.

On Tuesday, Montreal executive committee member Benoit Dorais told reporters that the city was applying its right of first refusal to purchase about 100 privately owned rooming houses, in which a person rents a single private room, and shares amenities such as bathrooms or kitchens. The move means the city has the right to match an offer to purchase them if they come for sale.

He said Montreal had already purchased four of the homes and was looking to buy more, describing them as “the principle solution to fight homelessness.”