YWCA Hamilton hopes to keep 90-unit project alive after dashed funding hopes

YWCA Hamilton has secured a property, but now it needs funding to build 90 units of transitional housing for women and children.

The agency had a chance last year to land tens of millions in federal dollars toward the roughly $40-million project through a limited funding envelope.

But that window closed when the YWCA couldn't line up provincial or municipal partners to back up its federal application.

So Hamilton lost that opportunity," Medora Uppal, chief operating officer, told The Spectator.

During a public feedback session Monday ahead of 2023 budget talks, Uppal told the new city council about how the YWCA's chance to secure federal dollars for the project disintegrated.

She joined other agency representatives in making pitches to 10 new faces around the 16-seat city hall horseshoe, including Mayor Andrea Horwath, following the Oct. 24 election.

The YWCA was banking on the federal government for nearly all of the capital expense and six years of operating dollars to turn its plans into reality.

The Ontario government and city offered letters of support for its application to the federal National Housing Plan initiative, but committed no funding.

With the province in election mode last spring, the YWCA looked to the city for a $3-million capital contribution and support for operating expenses after the sixth year, when the hoped-for federal funds would run out.

We were not able to achieve that," Uppal said in an interview.

Meanwhile, in June, YWCA Regina landed nearly $34 million from the federal government toward 68 transitional units and 40 shelter beds, notes a Canada Mortgage and Housing Corporation (CMHC) news release.

The City of Regina provided the land, valued at $2 million, and the province $1 million in funding.

At the time of the YWCA Hamilton's request this past spring, the city's budget - including the allocation of provincial social service relief funds - was fully committed toward" ongoing efforts to respond to homelessness, Michelle Baird, director of housing services, wrote in an email.

The city remains committed to meeting the short and long-term housing and shelter needs of women, transgender and non-binary and people experiencing homelessness."

Baird noted the city has contributed $8.2 million toward Good Shepherd's Arkledun Avenue initiative to create housing with support services for 73 women, transgender and non-binary people experiencing homelessness. That project also received about $16.3 million in federal funding and $4.75 million from the province.

The YWCA is keeping the location for its project private while it finalizes the deal, but the site's zoning is right for demolishing and building anew, Uppal said.

In the meantime, the agency is urging the federal and provincial governments to offer funding - for operational and capital costs alike - to keep its project alive and boost others.

But the city should also create a clear pathway" to municipal contributions without roadblocks" so Hamilton agencies can take advantage of chances for federal funding when they arise, Uppal said. We have to move pretty quickly and be really flexible."

Last summer, the YWCA was among a coalition of non-profit housing providers that warned the previous council that scores of projects were in jeopardy without municipal funding commitments to help line up federal CMHC dollars.

The agency's missed opportunity to create 90 units of transitional housing comes amid a housing affordability crunch in Hamilton and overburdened shelters that are regularly forced to turn women away.

That's evident outside the YWCA's building downtown on MacNab Street, where it operates an overnight program for women, trans and nonbinary people with nowhere else to go, Uppal told council.

You can walk by any time of the day and see people sleeping rough out in front."

Uppal also urged council to be proactive" in pursuing an intersectional, gender-based budget" to help ensure women and gender-diverse people, including racialized residents, aren't left behind in the city's spending plan.

Here's what other delegates told the new group of city politicians:

• Karl Andrus, of the Hamilton Community Benefits Network, encouraged council to establish a housing master plan akin to blueprints for roads, cycling and parks. The city's existing housing and homelessness strategy is aspirational" and lacks the hard numbers" to map out Hamilton's housing needs and ways to pay for them, Andrus said.

• The Hamilton Alliance for Tiny Shelters (HATS) made a pitch for $100,000 a year in city funding to help support a community of eight-by-10-feet cabins for those living on the street. Our real hope is to get this set up this winter," said HATS president Julia Kollek, whose group has found a site for an initial 10 cabins in a vacant lot on Barton Street East at Sherman Avenue.

• Tom Cooper, of the Hamilton Roundable for Poverty Reduction, Ted Hildebrandt, of the Social Planning and Research Council of Hamilton, and Anthony Marco, of the Hamilton and District Labour Council, urged extending a living wage to city summer students. Living Wage Hamilton, a coalition of community groups, has calculated $19.05 an hour as the lowest rate residents need to earn to afford living in the city.

• Zoe Green, of the Bay Area Climate Change Council, and Ian Borsuk, of Environment Hamilton, urged council to take more action on the climate crisis. Increasing staffing in the city's climate office, in particular, is incredibly important," Borsuk said.

• Kojo Damptey, of the Hamilton Centre for Civic Inclusion, spoke of the importance of backing up the city's community safety and well-being safety plan, with adequate funding to tackle such challenges as homelessness, racism and violence. Council should also expand its board of health to include health experts from the community, said Damptey, who ran for council in Ward 14.

• Christine Seketa, another Ward 14 candidate, said she wanted to help drive a sense of urgency" over the city's Vision Zero efforts to improve traffic safety. In an emotional address, she reflected how her son was struck by a car in 2018 while biking but fortunately" was wearing a helmet. Seketa said the city should lower its speed limits.

• Jessica Bonilla-Damptey, director of the Sexual Assault Centre Hamilton and Area (SACHA), pointed our her small agency has one public education worker to cover schools, sports teams, sports places and everywhere" in the entire city. There's a five-month wait for counselling, she said. It's too long to wait for services when you are ready to receive those supports."

Teviah Moro is a reporter at The Spectator. tmoro@thespec.com