At face value, city council’s decision to defer action on two transitional housing complexes seemed at odds with ongoing messaging around ending homelessness as a priority.
After all, the city has long flagged the need for more transitional housing units as an integral piece to eventually closing the sanctioned encampment they recently established downtown.
Their plan to bring a functional end to homelessness by 2030, a largely unfunded framework adopted last year, also flags this need.
During Wednesday’s budget deliberations, city council members faced two business cases which proposed new transitional housing complexes totalling 65 units, with 25 in a youth building and 40 in an Indigenous building.
Both business cases were deferred to 2027.
On whether this will delay proceeding with the builds, Mayor Paul Lefebvre told local media shortly after the meeting wrapped, “Not at all.”
“This is still happening, and other levels of government will be working with staff to identify the properties for where this can be,” he said, reiterating; “It’s still happening.”
With no funding from senior levels of government to date, the business cases laid out what it would look like if the municipality fully funded their operations. Between the two buildings, the impact on the tax levy would be a 0.55-per-cent hike in 2026 and a 1.05-per-cent increase by 2027.
The youth project would cost $10 million for the building (plus annual operational costs of $1,490,016), while the Indigenous building would cost $15 million (plus annual operational costs of $2,642,977), according to estimates laid out in the business cases.
(The business cases also relied on one-third capital funding between all three levels of government to build the two complexes, despite the city having yet to secure federal and provincial funding.)
Given that the city is currently advocating for senior levels of government to help fund these projects, Lefebvre argued that there’s no sense in laying the groundwork for a 100-per-cent municipal contribution for their operations.
“You don’t go to other levels of government with an application when you’re funding the whole thing,” he said. “They won’t give you a dime.”
Three levels of government coming together resulted in the Lorraine Street 40-unit transitional housing complex, while an additional partner in a private or non-profit organization created the Pearl Street deeply affordable 38-unit build and the 347-unit Project Manitou building under construction downtown, of which 105 units will be classified as affordable.
Lefebvre said there isn’t a projected timeline for when the city will proceed with the transitional housing, since it will depend on when they get funding from the federal and provincial governments.
“This was definitely needed yesterday, so we are working with other levels of government to do this as fast as we can,” he said. “We’re looking at every possibility for funding these, but it is a priority for this council and we’re going to be applying as soon as that (funding) window opens.”
That said, he also clarified, “We are one of many thousands of municipalities, that are dealing with this crisis across this country, and the money they’ve set aside is limited.”
The transitional housing complexes the city is striving to build target the chronically homeless, with on-site supports aiming to ease them into permanent community housing.
At Lorraine Street, 24/7 wraparound services staffed through Health Sciences North work with residents to help them achieve their goals.
“It’s a short-term place to stay where we enable folks to identify the goals they need to reach in order to transition from surviving on the streets toward living independently,” Dr. Tara Leary told city council members during a presentation about the staffing complement in October.
The city’s latest homelessness data counted 254 people as residing in encampments across 50 locations in Greater Sudbury in September.
During budget deliberations, city council members deferred other business cases to 2027, including demolishing the Sudbury Community Arena. Since the arena won’t be demolished until after the new event centre opens in 2028 (if it’s demolished at all), this deferral will not have an impact.
Other deferrals include proceeding with phase two of the Municipal Road 55 / Lorne Street infrastructure renewal (100 metres west of Kelly Lake Road to Logan Avenue) and implementing sustainable waste strategies to help extend the life of municipal landfills.
Tyler Clarke covers city hall and political affairs for Sudbury.com.