A new report with 22 recommendations for ‘transforming’ Toronto’s housing system and bringing more affordable stock to market is set to go to the Executive Committee next week.
Prepared by the Deputy City Manager for Development and Growth Services, the report speaks of advancing a “City-led development model” with respect to five housing-ready sites: 405 Sherbourne Street, 150 Queens Wharf Road, 1113-1117 Dundas Street West, 11 Brock Avenue, and 35 Bellevue Avenue.
In the recommended model, the City would act as a public builder in overseeing the development process and undertaking any due diligence. City staff would also be expected to “report back by Q3 2024 with a status update and to identify any tools and new approaches needed to expand this model to additional sites.”
An additional 47 City-owned, housing-ready sites and 31 non-profit-owned sites stand to be developed under this model.
According to a press release from the City, the recommendations included in the report “support a generational change and a systemic shift aiming to build homes faster and encouraging all orders of government to take greater responsibility in increasing housing supply.”
As such, the report also calls on the Province to allocate between $500M and $800M per year in grant funding, as well as $6.5B and $8B in low-cost financing and re-payable loans, to Toronto over the next seven years. Those funds, says the report, would be used to “support delivery of the updated HousingTO Plan new homes target,” which was recently bumped up to 65,000 rent-controlled homes. To date, funding has been secured to deliver just 4,455 homes within that target.
Also rather notably, the report urges the Ontario government to reinstate rent control rules for units first occupied after November 15, 2018 — something that Mayor Olivia Chow floated while on the campaign trail this summer.
The report in its entirety will be considered by the Executive Committee on Tuesday, October 31, and by City Council between Wednesday, November 8, and Friday, November 10.
