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To All Regional and City Candidates:
Please feel free to email the following items to have them posted on this page:
This page will be open to postings until Saturday October 22, 2022. Thanks in advance and best of luck to all in their bid for council seats! |
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The drop down lists below contain information as provided by the candidates surrounding their views on housing and homelessness. The candidates who've signed the Unsheltered Pledge as well contain an image recognizing this. Candidates name contains link provided to their platform. Additional Info posted based solely on candidate reply and relay. Click the "+" on the right to view that section of candidates and their responses. Region of Waterloo Regional Chair (1)
I propose a multi-faceted approach: first, we must acknowledge the devastating effect of mental health and addiction, and focus on a solution that tackles the underlying root cause for homelessness in these visible spaces. We cannot simply move these residents into affordable housing or shelter systems, as their unique situations leave many of them incapable of maintaining property, or following the rules set out in these systems: We need to develop a fully funded mental health and addiction center, equipped with properly trained healthcare staff and personnel. We need the placement of this center to be away from the main corridors of the cities, move all safe consumption sites to this area, and develop semi-permanent residences within the boundaries of these facilities. We may utilize private shuttle services to move these residents in and out of the primary city centers to address their right to mobility. We need to constructively contain these populations to allow for easy patrolling of the residents, access to systems and services that will attempt to treat them, collection of data to ensure we are adequately identifying key information about these people, a safe-zone for them to participate in consumptive activity, and to make cleanliness a simpler issue to manage. For the population who are not mentally ill, or addicted, but are disabled, or escaping domestic abuse, or other concerns, we must provide staff that can work to assess the particular needs and challenges of each person/family on a case by case basis, and work to constructively prioritize access to affordable housing based on individualized needs assessments until we have enough space for all residents who need it. Furthermore, we must cut red-tape and fees for development (including non-affordable developments) to encourage more expedient prioritization of affordable units. For those who are capable, and face stigma from the other residents of Waterloo Region, I would encourage them to participate in the exchange of shelter for service - an opportunity for them to give back to the community, develop skills, and earn their dignity by working under the Region to care for the land and maintain the cities/townships - in turn we would provide shelter, food, clothing, clean water, and electricity. The Region can reallocate resources from our park and city maintenance to cover the costs of these shelter services; a tax-payer neutral system. Other information on a wider array of topics can also be found on my website, but also through my social media (Twitter,Facebook,Instagram) by searching @dacostaforKW Cambridge (1)
Kitchener (6)
I’m an award-winning equity and inclusion consultant, educator, and community builder. I’m also a lifelong Kitchener resident, mother, wife, business owner, and volunteer board member. I have 15 years of municipal government experience, including nearly a decade as a staff member at the Region of Waterloo working directly with council as a Research Assistant. As a result, I understand how things work and know how to get things done.
I love Waterloo Region and care about our collective future. As I listen and engage with residents, I know many in our community don’t see themselves reflected at Regional Council. I want to change that. I want to ensure all voices are heard and represented. I’m focused on building a community that works for all and creating a place where we can all thrive. Platform Overview: My platform centres on my values as a leader. These values determine my approach to making decisions on behalf of the community. My values are ongoing and work on a continuum. They include: building trusted relationships; having equity-informed community discussions; listening and collaborating; empowering and amplifying; taking meaningful action and being accountable. My platform features seven key issues facing our community: housing, access to services, smart investing, safer communities, the environment, transportation and reconciliation. By remaining true to my values as a leader, I believe we can tackle each of these issues together and build a Region of Waterloo that works for all. Housing and Homelessness: The most important issue facing the Region of Waterloo is housing. I approach this issue from three key perspectives: affordable housing, housing the unhoused and availability of homes. There is no doubt, we are in a housing crisis. For many residents, the dream of owning a home is not a reality right now, and accessing affordable rentals is difficult. Additionally, Waterloo Region is expected to grow from 600,000 residents to one million. Given our current housing demographics, there will not be enough homes to accommodate families choosing to move here. As a result, housing must be a top priority for the next Regional Council. We must work to address affordable housing, find homes for the unhoused and look at ways to increase the availability of homes for families. This includes advocating on behalf of our community to the federal and provincial governments for additional funding as well as getting creative within our own community by partnering with the private sector. Finally, we must also focus on equity and access for residents, including access to homes, housing the unhoused, mental health supports and providing equitable access to services for all in our community.
Affordable housing is the other remedy we need to increase. We need to look at different and better ways to provide this to our community. We need to look at our master plan and make sure that we include this in any new development. We need to look at other communities that are having these issues and see how they have been dealing with it. We don't need to continue to recreate the wheel when someone else has ideas.
Decades of underfunding for non-profit and social housing, combined with restrictive zoning in the majority of our neighbourhoods, have exacerbated the problem.
Every dollar spent on housing and supports for those who are chronically homeless translates to over $2 in savings related to health care, the justice system, shelters, and other supports that the Region supports or provides. I will prioritize continued investments in support of the Region’s goal to build 500 units of affordable housing each year. In the immediate term, I believe the Region should retract its lawsuit to evict the residents of the Victoria & Weber St. encampment. On the contrary, we must recognize that encampment support on Regional lands (washrooms, waste collection, water access) is a necessary form of harm reduction while we work quickly to improve access to shelter and housing options. I know that new housing doesn’t get built overnight. As we increase the supply of affordable housing, the Region should expand its rent supplement program to get people housed immediately in the private market. Furthermore, our shelter system and supportive housing providers are in need of assistance to improve their mental health and addictions supports. We learned during the pandemic that new forms of shelter services, which provide private rooms and more stability, can help people find permanent housing more quickly. The complexity of support in these environments keeps increasing, and the Region’s funding model for supportive housing needs to adapt to recognize these growing mental health and addictions components too. Community - https://www.mattrodrigues.ca/community
Waterloo (2)
Question: What is your plan to address this gap in our community? This would include the Victoria St encampment - what do you think should be done to solve that situation? Answer: Indeed, there is stark and glaring evidence of social inequality visible at urban sites within our region. I find the same circumstances exist in in other municipalities that I have visited recently. Reviewing nation-wide media reports I conclude that the came circumstances exist in virtually all urban areas of Canada. I’m going to refer to this metaphorically as Canadian society, a body, suffering from a chronic disease, homelessness as a symptom. Continuing the metaphor, our community is an integral part of the body and the symptoms of the disease are painful. Urgent action is required treat the symptoms locally and action is required Provincially and Federally to cure the illness. The cure needs to be authentic, such that the symptoms are not masked and the infection does not return. To answer your question directly, as it pertains to municipal council, the immediate action is to employ all means of jurisdiction to stabilize the situation. This involves mustering the resources of the municipality as well as community organizations and individual citizens to triage and address the most acute needs, for example the safety and security of the unhoused living in the encampment. Council’s role is to guide our regional municipality to co-operate with its constituent municipalities and its community organizations and individual citizens in managing the acute situation. Hiding the problem by forcing the displacement of those citizens to a less conspicuous location is a non-starter for me. Longer term, the availability of housing that citizens can afford can be influenced by municipalities through the official plan, property zoning and the review of developer’s plans. It is the role of Council to ensure that the municipality makes the quality of life of all citizens the driver of development. Successive Provincial governments have continued to erode the authority of the municipalities to carry through with a plan that developers might find less profitable by allowing them appeal to provincial authority. There is a vital role for non-profit agencies, like Habitat for Humanity and Twin Cities Family Housing Foundation for example, to actually build the affordable housing. On Council, I would advocate scaling up not-for-profit development of housing in the Region. Recognizing that a municipality cannot address the root causes for citizens to become unhoused, it is the role of Council to hold the Provincial and Federal government to account. This can be accomplished through driving a new and concerted effort with all municipalities through the AMO and the FCM or perhaps a new forum. If we go back to the days of Paul Martin, then federal minister of finance, balancing the budget by downloading the bulk of health and social programs to the Provinces, but without most of the funding, we can see the start of the infection. Then successive Provincial governments similarly downloaded to the municipalities. The end result is that the property tax rolls of the municipalities are unable to sustain the cost of services required by citizens. I support a way forward that accounts for the quality of life of all citizens of our region. TownShips (0)
Cambridge Mayor (0)
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With respect to homelessness, The City policies and programs need to be developed with input from people with lived experience. Current emergency shelters are overcrowded and must be adequately funded. We need separate and dedicated emergency shelters for youth; currently youth from Cambridge either seek shelter across the 401 or at The Bridges. We need social supports in the form of trained staff (child and youth workers, social service workers, social workers, addiction and mental health workers) available because being homeless is stressful and the transition to housing is too important and too difficult to leave vulnerable people alone to cope with all the challenges. Often, people who are homeless have suffered trauma, mental health challenges and / or addiction. Remember the story of Million Dollar Murray? Malcolm Gladwell focused attention on Murray Barr and the million dollars spent in ten years by the city of Reno for a series of interventions like emergency room visits and police calls. We need to have relationships with the people who are homeless and the programming and funding to make sure these professional relationships include system navigation and treatment as required. Emergency shelter, by definition, is a crisis intervention and so people do not create their home in a shelter; they merely have a place to sleep and perhaps some meals. It is important to make sure people transition as quickly as responsively, with support, to long term housing so that everyone has a place to call home. Municipalities can negotiate together for increased federal and provincial investment and Cambridge can collaborate with the Region of Waterloo and local housing organizations and businesses to maximize success for housing investment in the City. We can integrate social impact considerations about affordable housing when developers approach the City Planning department to order to facilitate business investment / participation in affordable housing units. In addition, affordable housing can be maximized with social innovation in programming. For example, Housing First ensures social supports for the most vulnerable people for long-term success. Another promising social innovation are Land Trusts which can be used to mitigate against rising property costs for affordable housing and other social programs. As many people are aware, RARE is a land trust established for ecosystem protection, research and education. Land trusts can also be used to provide cost effective locations for affordable housing and non-profit social services. Ward 4 (1)
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Kitchener Mayor (0)
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One of the most profound things I heard was from Stephanie Mancini when I toured the Shelter Site at the former Schwaben Club. She said having an interim step like this is necessary for someone to be able to go into supportive housing. She told of a mother who was living in a tent, and went from that to a shelter situation. Stephanie said she needed the shelter step to be able to move into the YWCA Supportive housing units at Block Line Road.
To really make a difference, all levels of government must work together.and do what they can within their jurisdiction to create affordable and supportive housing units. As an example, the YWCA Supportive Housing Complex on Block Line Road. Kitchener provided land that is leased at a dollar a year. The Region of Waterloo used funding they received from the Federal Government's Rapid Housing Program and the YWCA is the service provider for these units. We need to use what's been successful in other places and create solutions of our own. Kitchener's Affordable Housing Advisory Committee has helped with creating Kitchener's Housing For All Strategy (https://www.kitchener.ca/en/strategic-plans-and-projects/housing-for-all.aspx) Kitchener has more land that can be used for affordable and supportive housing, can make use of the 2 million dollar reserve fund we created for Affordable Housing and continue to do things like secure loans like we did for oneROOF. Affordable Housing Page From My Website: https://www.daveschnider.com/affordable-housing.html
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region for the last 2 years. Affordable housing is an issue that cannot be tackled alone. Property taxes alone cannot support the cause. Nationwide construction costs are soaring, borrowing costs are soaring and skilled trades within the construction industry are shrinking. Collaboration at all levels of government, non profit housing and private community partners is what I would focus on. I want to ensure we address all levels of housing within the housing continuum. Housing needs to be attainable for future generations. Homelessness needs compassion. The city has punched above its weight by supporting A Better Tent City, providing land to 41 YWCA beds women’s shelter, and financially supported One Roof. The city has ear marked city lands and have $15 million dollars in budget from the Make IT 2.0 strategy to continue investing where possible within the city’s jurisdiction. The city of Kitchener does not have the capacity to deal with this. The city does not receive provincial funding or have the qualified staff. This is where I feel the Regions expertise and their jurisdiction take the lead on this in collaboration with the city in a supporting role. Ward 8 (0)
Ward 9 (2)
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Waterloo MAyor (3)
Sadly, the number of homeless people in Waterloo Region tripled from 333 in 2018 to 1085 in September, 2021, the last time a point-in-time count of the homeless population was undertaken. I believe that the next count will reveal an even larger number today. As more people have been pushed into homelessness due to COVID-related job loss and increased housing and living costs, we have more and more people living rough. In the short term, Region of Waterloo and City of Kitchener have allowed the homeless encampments in Victoria Park and at the corner of Weber and Victoria to continue, and have provided land for A Better Tent City. However, as the winter approaches, we need to find better housing solutions for the people currently living outside. The Region and the City of Waterloo have been working closely with The Working Centre for the past two years and are using the housing formerly owned by the University of Waterloo (married students’ apartments) as housing. As well, the former Comfort Inn is being converted into supportive housing by the House of Friendship for up to 100 men who require housing and addiction support. All of this work is important and needs to continue. Long-term solutions to prevent vulnerable populations from ending up without a home are needed and as Mayor, I will work with the federal government’s housing initiatives and the Region of Waterloo to access the supports needed. You may be interested in the Region’s recommendations for interim housing solutions to help address increased homelessness across Waterloo Region, which was released in August, 2022. Specifically, as is stated on my website, one of my commitments within the first 100 days in office is to work with my Council colleagues and senior administrative leaders to ensure that City-owned land in the RIM Park area remains in public hands. On this site, Waterloo should begin a collaborative development that will include transit links and active transportation infrastructure, green space, a park, a variety of amenities (retail, office space) in addition to housing that is either affordable/sustainable or co-operative. My plan to address housing availability, affordability, and homelessness also includes the following:
Ending homelessness in Waterloo Region will require a community-wide effort. If you have ideas, I would love to hear from you.
2. Solving the housing crisis for students. Discrimination and old fashioned behaviour and policies are driving up costs. Now it’s risen to become a safety and security issue. 3. We’ve had so much growth recently. Over the last 5 years, our population has grown by 16%. This is the equivalent of adding on a city almost the size of Stratford to Waterloo. To manage the growth, we need Leadership and Management experience. I’m the only candidate with 5 years of CEO experience with work across all levels of government and global responsibilities. I'm a leader. A strong leader. Waterloo needs my steady and inclusive leadership to bridge the gaps in delivering services to our residents. I have extensive private sector leadership experience as a Founder of a software company focused on housing and accommodation. In addition, I have extensive political experience; I have sat on numerous Ontario-wide clean tech, high tech, and other alliances. I have been the VP of Policy for a federal candidate, and I have worked with local government, non-profits, and city committees of council. My degree in Political Science from Wilfrid Laurier University gave me a great foundation for leadership and municipal politics. 4. Innovation in City Hall! It’s time to renew stability and innovation in our approaches to governance and implementation in Waterloo. WArd 1 (0)
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Woolwich
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Wilmot
North Dumfries
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Wellesley
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Find out who is running in our local Municipal Elections October 24, 2022:
You can as well find full lists of all municipal candidates HERE (PoliBlog Elections) Waterloo Region Votes - Information About the 2022 Election
For A Better Waterloo Region (FABWR) Who does what? - Citified Municipal Candidates - The Record News
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