$1.5 million from province for city for housing target progress

Today, Matthew Rae, Parliamentary Assistant to the Minister of Municipal Affairs and Housing, announced Ontario is providing Kawartha Lakes with more than $1.5 million in funding through the Building Faster Fund, after the municipality made substantial progress towards meeting its 2023 housing target, breaking ground on a total of 431 new housing units last year.

“I want to congratulate Kawartha Lakes and all municipalities that have worked hard to get shovels in the ground faster,” said Matthew Rae, parliamentary assistant to the minister of municipal affairs and housing. “Our challenge to these municipalities now is to redouble their efforts to build more homes than ever before so we can improve affordability and keep the dream of homeownership alive in Ontario. Our government will be there to support you every step of the way, including through our recent budget investment of more than $1.8 billion in housing-enabling infrastructure.”

Announced in August 2023, the Building Faster Fund is a three-year, $1.2 billion program that is designed to encourage municipalities to address the housing supply crisis. The fund rewards municipalities that make significant progress against their targets by providing funding for housing-enabling and community-enabling infrastructure. Funding is provided to municipalities that have reached at least 80 per cent of their provincially assigned housing target for the year with increased funding for municipalities that exceed their target.

“In 2023, our dedicated housing pledge team, which includes both staff and council members, united to achieve 90 per cent of our housing target,” said Doug Elmslie, mayor of Kawartha Lakes. “We remain steadfast in our commitment to meet this year’s goal and to approve housing solutions for needs across the entire housing spectrum. Thanks to the $1.5 million in funding from our provincial partner and MPP Laurie Scott, we are now in a strong position to advance the necessary infrastructure to facilitate housing approvals.”

The Building Faster Fund includes $120 million for small, rural and northern municipalities to help build housing-enabling infrastructure and prioritize projects that speed up the increase of housing supply.

Quick Facts

• Ontario is investing historic amounts in housing- and community-enabling infrastructure to get more homes built across the province including the Building Faster Fund and the Ontario Community Infrastructure Fund. The province recently announced a new $1 billion Municipal Housing Infrastructure Program as well as a quadrupling of the provincial Housing-Enabling Water Systems Fund to $825 million.
• In 2023, Ontario reached 99 per cent of its target of 110,000 new homes, which includes housing starts, additional residential units and new and upgraded long-term care beds.
• Ontario broke ground on 18,992 rental starts in 2023, the highest number of rental starts on record.
• The province saw nearly 10,000 additional residential units created in 2023 – which includes changing single family homes into multi-unit residences or converting commercial office space into residential use – and nearly 10,000 new and upgraded long-term care beds.