Policy paper
A New Way Home for Toronto’s Unhoused
This plan is about basic dignity and housing stability for people who deserve both. It does not require new money or new powers.
Policy document
The plan
This plan is about basic dignity and housing stability for people who deserve both. It does not require new money or new powers. The first step is to put one person in charge, reporting to the Mayor, and to mandate that every city division and agency implement the four-year plan outlined below. Next, we use available data, resources, and funding to deliver housing stability for those who are still unhoused.
Where Toronto stands
The problem in numbers
| Measure | Where Toronto stands |
|---|---|
| People homeless | The most recent point-in-time estimate was 15,400 in fall 2024, over double the 2021 figure. The October 2025 estimate counted 12,196; another is due in October 2026. |
| Sleeping outside | October 2025: 1,446 people staying outside, including encampments. 539 structures in November 2024; 196 in December 2025. 84 encampments on city property (March 15, 2026), down from 283 in March 2025. |
| City spending | $786 million gross on shelter operations in 2026. A hotel shelter space runs past $200 a night. A $1.1 billion ten-year shelter capital plan, including $556 million for George Street. |
| Shelter and overnight service occupancy | The last peaks were 10,228 in January 2025 and 9,217 in January 2026. In August 2026, the number was 7,640. On September 24, 7,262 people were accommodated. |
| Main exit tool | Toronto’s Canada-Ontario Housing Benefit allocation: $38 million in 2024, $19.75 million in 2025, $7.95 million in 2026. |
| Refugees and asylum claimants | Over half of those surveyed in 2024. About 2,100 a night projected for 2026. Federal support falls from $300 million to $97 million. |
| Rental market | Vacancy is at 3.0 per cent. Two-bedroom asking rents are 6 per cent below early 2024. Many investor condo units unsold. |
Read together, the numbers say one thing. Toronto runs an expensive waiting room, and the money goes to beds. The rental market is soft by Toronto standards, and nobody at City Hall is organized to use it.
A New Way Home
Seven parts
One command, one coalition
Dozens of agencies run dozens of programs, each with its own funding and its own intake. A New Way Home brings them into one City-led coalition with one plan.
Under one lead named within 30 days, with a mandate over outreach, shelter, coordinated access, and housing placement, a standing table of all relevant players meets weekly to fast-track any project or funding application that delivers results.
Case management for stable housing
The coalition uses one front door and one client list. Case managers see open units the way a travel agent sees seats. Clients are treated equally. Operators have incentives to house people, not fill beds.
Corporate and private sponsors
Ask Toronto’s corporate and philanthropic sector to help fund items government will not cover (e.g., a damage fund, furniture, first month’s rent, data management, etc.).
Invite private sponsors to work with unhoused clients, guiding them towards services they need, stable housing, skills training, and employment.
A landlord desk and a Toronto Housing Benefit
Housing first, then services. No sobriety test. No treatment requirement. An apartment, a lease, and a case manager who shows up.
A team whose only job is to sign units: guaranteed rent, a signing incentive, a damage fund, a 24-hour line. Aim for 1,000 units by summer 2027.
Pair it with a portable City rent benefit that fills the hole the provincial cut left. Every hotel shelter contract that ends converts into benefits and support workers, not savings. A hotel shelter space costs past $200 a night. A rent benefit with a support worker costs about $80.
Supportive housing for people without private rentals
Some people need staff on site. Within 120 days, an independent review tests the shelter capital plan against the supportive housing it could buy. Buy distressed condo and rental buildings. No building opens without Ontario Health-backed clinical staff.
The federal At Home/Chez Soi trial, run in part in Toronto, found that for every $10 spent housing the highest-need people, $21.72 was returned in avoided hospital, jail, and shelter costs. End discharges to the street from hospitals and jails.
Close encampments for good
Close the ten largest sites in 2027, one at a time. No site closes without stable housing offers; every site stays closed. Use the same teams on the TTC.
A separate door for refugee claimants
Target renewed federal settlement funding for Toronto and the rest of the GTHA to ensure refugees and asylum seekers have stable housing.
What gets measured
Targets
- People sleeping outside: under 1,000 by October 2027, under 200 by 2030.
- Nightly shelter use: 5,000 by August 2027, under 3,000 by August 2028.
- Returns to homelessness: under 15 per cent.
The cost
What it costs, and who pays in the meantime
Housing costs less than shelter for every person moved. But a bed cannot be closed the day its occupant leaves. Cities close programmes, not beds. So the real cost of this plan is the overlap: the months Toronto pays for an apartment and for the capacity it is emptying at the same time. That overlap is bounded and small.
[ Costing the first target of 1,000 units ]
| Year one | Cost |
|---|---|
| Rent benefit at about $1,000 a month, six-month occupancy | $6M |
| Support workers at $15,000 to $18,000 each | $8M |
| One-time costs (shared with the corporate and philanthropic sector) | $3–4M |
| Total, of which about $14 million is City money | $17M |
That is under two per cent of what Toronto already spends on shelter every year. Most would be covered by the $7.95 million Canada-Ontario Housing Benefit allocation (stacked, not replaced); by not opening new net shelter capacity in 2027; and from corporate and private donors. As shelters close, funding is re-allocated.
When
The timeline
| When | What happens |
|---|---|
| First 100 days | Keep current winter plan as is. Name lead. Convene table. |
| Year one: 2027 | Ten largest encampments resolved. Operator contracts rewritten to pay for exits. Discharge protocols signed. |
| 2028 to 2029 | Hotel shelters close as leases end and the dollars convert. First supportive buildings open with provincial staff. |
| 2030 | Shelter use under 2,000. Fewer than 200 outside. Multi-year funding agreements signed. |
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