An affordable housing complex planned for downtown Orillia will no longer be able to provide “deeply” affordable housing following the County of Simcoe’s denial of operating funding in February.
Raising the Roof’s Adrian Dingle updated city council on the 25 Peter St. N. project Monday, which will include 40 units atop the Canada Post building.
Raising the Roof hoped to secure federal Rapid Housing Initiative funding through the Canada Mortgage and Housing Corporation (CMHC), which would have allowed the developer to rent all 40 units at "deeply affordable" rates of roughly $434 per month.
The organization needed the support of multiple levels of government to secure the federal funding.
Although city council tentatively approved $130,000 in funding for the project earlier this year, the county denied Raising the Roof’s request for $200,000 in annual operating funding for 11 years, citing concerns about Bill 23’s impact on county funds, and about providing the requested 11 years in operating funding for the project when the Rapid Housing Initiative requires 20 years of affordability.
“This development concept was put together with the intent to provide deep levels of affordability and go towards an application for CMHC’s Rapid Housing Initiative,” Dingle said at Monday’s meeting. “This application window expired on March 15, just last week, and Raising the Roof did not actually submit an application for this opportunity to earn federal funding from CMHC.”
Despite the setback, Dingle said Raising the Roof is still obligated to make 24 of the 40 units affordable, at 80 per cent of market rate.
“To give council an idea of the cost of this, it would be about $600 for a bachelor unit in your community,” he explained. “The remaining 16 units in our currently designed built form are intended to be available at market rents for any community members that would be interested in living in the building.”
Dingle did say, however, that Raising the Roof remains committed to finding ways to increase affordability for the project.
“Raising the Roof’s mandate is that of a homelessness prevention charity. We are looking constantly (at) additional financial opportunities for us to provide more deeply affordable rents (and) more support at this building,” he said. “That is going to be the journey of our progress over the next several months as we prepare for a site plan application with the City of Orillia.”
Mayor Don McIsaac questioned whether there will be another opportunity to secure Rapid Housing Initiative funding.
“I understand that while the county turned you down, you'll have a second chance in the fall. Is that correct, to get the funding?” McIsaac asked.
“An additional round of the Rapid Housing Initiative will open at the end of this year,” Dingle said. “I think that we developed a significant amount of support within Simcoe County council that wasn't necessarily anticipated by staff at the outset, and I am hopeful that we can come up with an operating solution with them to be able to provide more of the units at affordable rates and deeper levels of affordability.”
