Toronto nonprofit has a solution for affordable housing but it's not being used yet
A Toronto-based nonprofit corporation has created an incredible solution to help mitigate the unsheltered crisis in the city, but its plan has not been formally implemented by the City — at least, not yet.
Two Steps Home (2SH) is backed by a team of volunteer architects, engineers, carpenters, and retired public servants with decades of collective experience working in affordable and supportive housing.
The organization is proposing to make use of future City development sites by building temporary cabin communities to get unhoused individuals out of the cold until construction begins.
"We know the City of Toronto is planning to build 65,000 permanent affordable housing units on municipal land, however permitting and construction can take five years or more (often many, many more)," 2SH's Director, Robert Raynor told blogTO.
"So we have all of this land that isn't being used to its potential, and simultaneously have a homelessness crisis, with existing shelters that are way over capacity and don't provide people with the life tools they need to stay in permanent housing even when it is offered to them."
Rayor was a carpenter with Khaleel Seivwright's Toronto Tiny Shelters project from 2020 to 2021 and helped to build approximately two-thirds of the 110 shelters.
2SH's proposed communities would involve 50 lockable cabins, which would offer residents electric heating and AC, safety, security, and privacy.
Each community would also have central spaces, with kitchens, dining areas, washrooms, washing machines, and wraparound supports. The cabin communities would be run by experienced shelter operations, decrease strain on City services, and provide residents with access to basic needs.
Once the permanent affordable housing construction begins on the City development sites, the organization would move to the next site, where the process would repeat.
Raynor says cabin communities are a proven model across the country, inexpensive, and make use of currently vacant land to bring people inside within months — not years.
"When led by a city that understands and with operators who care, [cabin communities] can be so much more than that. They become the first real safety net that someone has experienced in years: a safe way to have heat, a locking door, a place to heal that doesn't strip you of community," Raynor said.
"They provide the physiological solutions of shelter, the safety security needs of affordable housing, and the love and belonging found in encampments. They help people move on to permanent housing, and set them up to be able to stay in permanent housing. And most importantly, it provides them with a dignified place to live."
The organization presented its model at the Economic and Community Development Committee in May, and spoke with councillors and staff about how it could be implemented.
"We've invited them to view our prototype at 110 Adelaide St E., and expect to continue conversations to further the model and integrate it into the shelter system," Raynor told blogTO.
"The recipe for creating a community like this is to combine lived-experience research, land, capital funding, like-minded operators, and community and political support," he continued.
"Being a group of volunteers and functioning as a not-for-profit, we rely on donations to fund the cabin community design and operating budget of our organization, but we believe that the end result and positive impact that we will have for unhoused Torontonians will be more than worth every penny."
The organization is continuing to share its model to build community and political support, and actively fundraising to cover its operating expenses and capital costs for a pilot community. The hard costs for a fifty-cabin community would be approximately $2.5 million.
Once they have City approval and land, 2SH expects that it can have a pilot community up and running within six months.
Two Steps Home
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