Latest news with #communityhousing
CBC
09-07-2025
- Business
- CBC
AISH recipients in community housing will see rent hike under new Alberta regulations
Albertans who receive payments under AISH, or Assured Income for the Severely Handicapped, who live in community housing where rent is set at 30 per cent of income will soon see the amount increase by $220 a month. Changes to the Social Housing Accommodation Regulation, approved by cabinet via orders-in-council in May and June, will result in an AISH recipient who receives $1,901 a month paying $570 in rent. The current amount is $349 a month. The changes take effect Oct. 1 for new tenants or at an existing tenant's next annual rent review. AISH recipients used to have $735 of their monthly amount exempted from the eligible income used to determine rent. An order in council signed on May 15 by Assisted Living and Social Services Minister Jason Nixon removed that exemption. Personal benefits remain exempt. This set of benefits covers expenses such as some of the cost of medical equipment and supplies, special dietary needs and maintenance of wheelchairs and scooters. The changes are meant to "increase fairness" in how rent is assessed. People on government benefit programs like AISH and income support pay about 17 per cent of their income on rent. Nixon was not made available for an interview with CBC News. His press secretary provided a written statement instead. "Under the revised approach, rent for social community housing tenants and housing benefit recipients will be calculated as 30 per cent of total household income, treating household income from employment and assistance programs equally," Amber Edgerton wrote in an email. "This new approach aligns with the 2020 Affordable Housing Review Panel recommendations and creates a clear, standardized approach to rent setting that is fair to all tenants." Housing providers were notified about the change via a June 13 letter from an assistant deputy minister in Nixon's department. Simplifying rent Irene Martin-Lindsay, executive director of the Alberta Seniors and Community Housing Association, said housing providers asked for the change to simplify how the rent is calculated. The current system creates inequities in rent depending on a tenant's circumstances, she said. Someone who is employed or on senior benefits is charged 30 per cent of their income or more depending on the size of the unit. Martin-Lindsay said providers will advocate with the government to ensure people on AISH get the support they need. "We agree with equitable treatment of income in principle, but we don't want to create hardship for anybody because we know that everybody's situation isn't the same," she said. "Do they have other medical costs that can't be covered? Do they have other expenses that are over and above? Housing is one piece of what you need to live on." Groups that advocate for people with disabilities say they hadn't heard about the changes until they were contacted by CBC News. Doug Manderville, president of the board of directors for Voice of Albertans with Disabilities, was once on AISH after becoming quadriplegic in his early twenties. He is upset the Alberta government will not allow AISH recipients to keep the $200 Canada Disability Benefit, making it an outlier among the provinces. Manderville says the rent increases will add more financial strain. "People with disabilities struggle enough, whether it be physically or mentally," Manderville said. "Struggle every single day, just getting up in the morning, just having proper services, proper care, proper housing, food on the table and now they have to worry about this … it's not fair." The government is taking additional measures to determine rent and rental subsidies. The Canada Child Benefit and Alberta Child and Family Benefit will be included as income for setting rent for people who receive rent supplements starting Jan. 1, 2027. The same benefits will be considered eligible income when determining rent in community housing at the start of 2028, which will result in rent supplements decreasing and rents increasing for this set of renters. Civida, a social housing provider in Edmonton, said 16 per cent of their tenants have AISH as their primary source of income. In a written statement, the organization said it plans to implement the changes.
RNZ News
01-07-2025
- Business
- RNZ News
Kainga Ora cuts new developments as the housing crisis escalates
In Onehunga, Auckland, the site where a 186-apartment Kainga Ora development was planned now sits empty, after tenants of the previous building moved out and the new project was cancelled. Photo: Sharon Brettkelly New Zealand is short tens of thousands of social houses, and billions of dollars to fund them, while the numbers of "stressed" renters is growing, but a community housing leader says we can still fix the crisis that has dragged on for decades. "I actually believe as New Zealanders if we put our minds to this and we make some different choices we can absolutely solve this housing crisis," says Community Housing Aotearoa chief executive Paul Gilberd. But it will not happen overnight, and as demand grows he warns that overall investment in new social housing is falling. The "magic thing" that unlocks the ability to build the houses at scale is government funding of the community housing sector, he says. "If the government is willing to turn that dial up, we can as a sector walking alongside Kainga Ora, deliver the things that I think New Zealanders want in terms of the vision of the sort of country they live in," he says. Gilberd has worked in the sector for decades and in his current role oversees 100 community housing providers (CHPs) that run more than 30,000 homes. He says Kainga Ora's announcement last month that it has cancelled plans to build nearly 3500 new homes around the country and is capping the numbers of state-owned homes it provides at 78,000 is a reflection of a government that sees itself in a diminished role in commissioning new affordable housing, while backing the CHPs to fill the gap. He is telling his members to find partners such as church groups and local councils to deliver as many affordable homes as they can. The new Community Housing Funding Agency is a step in the right direction to finding the tens of billions of dollars needed to build more than 20,000 extra homes, he says, but it falls short of similar agencies in other countries which have the gold standard full government guarantee. "Then it becomes a gamechanger because it reduces the risk to investors," he says. Jeremy, a neighbour of a cancelled Kainga Ora project in Onehunga, Auckland tells The Detail of the saga of the on/off development that went on for years before the final announcement last month. Jeremy and his wife bought their house in 2018, believing that they would be living next door to architecturally designed, state-owned apartments. "It's been an empty site for over a year now and that peace is lovely for us right now but it's not a long-term solution. The thing that I wonder about is how much of this development next door is now going to be completely piecemeal," he says. For Newsroom Pro managing editor Jonathan Milne, the development on Jordan Avenue is close to his heart, as an Onehunga resident and former local school board member. He says that the tenants who were moved out of the development for the rebuild were promised first dibs on the new apartments. When he tried to track down families who had lived there before it was demolished, they were nowhere to be found. "I spent days trying to find former tenants of Jordan Ave, I couldn't find any. No one knows where they've gone, no one knows their phone numbers anymore, they've just disappeared." He says the dramatic change at Kainga Ora is difficult for the tenants. "In all this discussion we've heard a lot about dollars and hectares and numbers of residences and square metres, but we haven't heard from the voices of the tenants." Check out how to listen to and follow The Detail here . You can also stay up-to-date by liking us on Facebook or following us on Twitter .
The Guardian
28-06-2025
- Health
- The Guardian
Harvey Coyne is facing triple-heart bypass surgery. His social housing provider wants to evict him
Sitting on his hospital bed, his voice scratchy and strained, Harvey Coyne gives a bleak insight into what will happen if he's evicted from community housing in Perth. 'Without it, I'm pretty well buggered,' Coyne says. The Noongar elder, 66, is suffering from serious ill health. He has severe heart disease, requiring a pending triple bypass surgery, and this week had another heart attack, which left him hospitalised in Perth's Fiona Stanley hospital. Coyne has emphysema, hypertension and is blind in one eye. Earlier this year, he suffered a fall that left him with a broken hip. He was taken from his family as part of the Stolen Generations, leaving him with complex trauma. Coyne has been forced to fight another battle, too. Sign up for Guardian Australia's breaking news email The provider of his community housing unit in Kenwick, on the south-eastern fringes of Perth, is trying to kick him out. The organisation, Housing Choices Australia, has used a no-fault eviction – something that Western Australia, unlike most other states, still deems lawful – to remove him. Coyne and his advocates say the decision to evict him will force him into homelessness, returning him to the rough sleeping that he endured before moving into the Housing Choices Australia property in 2021. Court documents allege the termination notice was sent while Coyne was both hospitalised and grieving for his nephew, who died while living with him. The documents allege he was subjected to 10 inspections in a single year. Each raised new issues that Coyne said he 'struggled to address … due to my age and health'. The case has led to an intervention by leading health researcher Emeritus Prof Fiona Stanley, a former Australian of the Year and namesake of the hospital where Coyne was being treated this week. Stanley earlier this year wrote to Housing Choices Australia expressing her 'grave' concerns about its treatment of Coyne – particularly given his pending triple-bypass. 'This is an extremely serious operation with a number of risks for Mr Coyne. It is imperative that he has stable and secure accommodation in which to prepare for this procedure and then to recover and rehabilitate afterwards,' Stanley wrote in March. 'Mr Coyne's condition is life-threatening, and it is inconceivable to me that he should face homelessness at this time.' Coyne is now fighting his eviction in the Perth magistrates court, which is due to deliver judgment next week. Housing Choices Australia said it was unable to comment on Coyne's case specifically due to ongoing legal proceedings and privacy concerns. 'Housing Choices Australia is committed to providing safe, secure, and appropriate housing for all our residents and supporting them to sustain their tenancies,' the chief executive officer, David Fisher, said. 'As a not-for-profit community housing provider, we operate under the same standards and regulatory requirements as government housing agencies, and we take that responsibility seriously.' It previously told advocates it was working with the state government to find a 'sustainable housing solution that considers both his immediate and longer-term needs'. Sign up to Breaking News Australia Get the most important news as it breaks after newsletter promotion Court documents suggest it had previously raised concerns about noise, visitation and the cleanliness of the property, all of which Coyne disputes. Academics and Coyne's housing advocate, Jesse Noakes, say his case is symptomatic of a broader issue. Coyne's home would once have been part of the public housing system. Now, the state government has shifted it to community housing under the management of Housing Choices Australia. Experts say state and federal governments are increasingly relying on organisations like Housing Choices Australia to house low-income and vulnerable citizens. The trend is leading to unnecessary evictions and the erosion of tenant rights, they say. In a briefing paper on Coyne's case, David Kelly, a human geographer with RMIT's Centre for Urban Research, said community housing units had increased by 61.4% in the past decade, helped in part by heavy government subsidies. The stock of public housing units had declined by 7.4% over the same period. Kelly said the shift had 'redefined both the nature of the tenancy and the rights attached to it'. 'Tenants like Harvey, had they remained in public housing, would have been afforded stronger on-paper protections against eviction, and subjected to fewer behavioural interventions disguised as support,' he said. 'These homes have been steadily moved into the portfolios of community housing organisations (CHOs), who operate under different regulatory frameworks and priorities.' Housing Choices Australia receives public funding. Records filed with the ACNC suggest about half of its yearly revenue, or roughly $33m, comes from government funding. It also manages a huge number of dwellings. As of mid-2024, records show it owned 3,099 units and managed a further 4,395 units of housing. Its total assets are worth $1.2bn, according to its latest financial reports. The not-for-profit publicly states that its vision is for 'all people in Australia to have a safe, affordable home and the opportunity to thrive'. WA Greens MLC Tim Clifford said Coyne's case illustrated the dangers of outsourcing public housing. He said it was 'unconscionable' that he should face eviction, given his ill health. 'It is clear from Mr Coyne's case that the choice to outsource public housing to big NGOs means that there is less transparency, less accountability and less access to justice for renters,' Clifford said. Fisher said Housing Choices Australia strongly believed that community housing -operated social housing was an important part of the solution to the 'growing housing crisis in our country'.
The Guardian
17-06-2025
- Business
- The Guardian
Building our way out of social housing unaffordability may no longer be possible
Few would deny that social and affordable housing is in short supply in Australia. The 'social' part of this refers to homes rented out by public housing departments and not-for-profit community housing providers to very low-income Australians, usually at 25% of the tenant's income. But, as highlighted by Guardian Australia, the growing class of 'affordable rental housing' is less clearly defined. In general terms, it is a product that targets the growing population of low-to-moderate-income workers earning above the rock bottom income eligibility thresholds for a social tenancy, but who are hard-pressed to find a suitable home in the private market. The main problem this product seeks to solve is that our private rental sector has been 'going upmarket' for decades. That is, generating fewer and fewer homes affordable to people in the lowest two-fifths of the income spectrum – including those in the second income quintile, ineligible for social housing. Census-based evidence shows that, as a result, Australia's national shortfall of affordable and available private rental dwellings for renters in the second income quintile almost doubled in the 15 years to 2021 – up from 87,000 dwellings to 152,000 dwellings. The problem has been exacerbated by a quarter of a century of negligible social housing growth, even as need for such accommodation has shot up thanks to rising population and inequality. Thus, as a share of our national housing stock, social housing has declined from more than 6% in the 1990s to barely 4% today. State and territory governments have been rationing remaining tenancies ever more tightly as a result, more or less restricting these to households reliant on social security payments. This is why the low-income workers essential to the operation of the modern urban economy nowadays have next to no chance of a public or community housing tenancy. It is also one reason that Australian governments have taken a growing interest in enabling an 'affordable rental housing' product that could make it possible for people in this situation to live reasonably near their work. Sign up for Guardian Australia's breaking news email At a big picture level, this is a problem that, according to conventional wisdom, can be tackled by expanding overall housing supply. But it is doubtful that 'building our way out of housing unaffordability' is even possible. And, without major complementary actions, it is unimaginable that such a strategy could significantly moderate market rents in the short-to-medium-term future. At least in the meantime, there is a case for governments to enable affordable rental housing construction as well as invest in expanding social housing. They can do this in one of two ways. The first is by directly subsidising housebuilding – such as under federal programs, including the Housing Australia Future Fund (Haff), which promises 20,000 new affordable rental homes by 2029. The second approach is the deployment of land-use planning or tax powers to require or incentivise private providers to include affordable rental units within market-price housing developments. The New South Wales and Victorian state governments, for example, have recently introduced or beefed up 'density bonus' schemes allowing developers to build higher and bigger, provided that projects include units renting at below-market prices. Using tax powers, the federal government has adopted a similar approach for Build to Rent projects. Under schemes of this type, affordable rents are typically defined relative to comparable market rents – often capped at 75-80% of local norms. When operated in high price areas like Sydney's Bondi, such a formula of course produces rents that sound outrageous outside that local context. Sign up to Breaking News Australia Get the most important news as it breaks after newsletter promotion Such homes might possibly assist the junior teachers, nurses and police officers so beloved of ministerial media statements, and there is an arguable case for policymaker attention to such housing needs. But this model is liable to produce rents far out of reach for low-income essential workers. And such units are, anyway, often required to be made available for only 10-15 years. But while it would be hard to justify directly funding 'affordable housing' of this kind, such homes are, in fact, generally produced through planning or tax concessions that represent only indirect government support. It is to be hoped that, on equity grounds, the directly subsidised affordable rental housing to be generated under the Haff and other ongoing federal programs will be subsidised sufficiently to produce units genuinely affordable to the low-income worker (or second income quintile) cohort. Equally, equity considerations dictate that the bulk of government financial support for social and affordable housing should be devoted to the former. It is only through expanding our minimal remaining stock of deeply subsidised housing that we can similarly expand access to secure and affordable homes for the most disadvantaged Australians. The bigger picture here is that, despite the expanded social and affordable housing investment committed under the Albanese government, Australia is still spending nowhere near enough to decisively reverse decades of neglect in this area. The case for phasing down private landlord tax breaks, with the resulting additional revenue redirected to expanding such investment, remains compelling. Hal Pawson is a professor of housing research and policy at the University of NSW and associate director of the UNSW City Futures Research Centre. He is the lead author of the Australian Homelessness Monitor series
RNZ News
15-06-2025
- Business
- RNZ News
Government targets affordable housing in Rotorua
Another 39 affordable rentals are planned for completion next year. Photo: 123RF The government hopes to provide more affordable housing in Rotorua, with a plan to deliver 189 homes. Associate Housing Minister Tama Potaka said up to 150 would be social housing homes completed by July 2027, working with Rotorua Lakes Council and community housing providers. A project consisting of 39 affordable rentals would also be delivered in 12 months by Ōwhata Kōhanga Rākau. "Rotorua is a priority location for housing," Potaka said. "We're backing community-led solutions to address the need here, which has seen disproportionate numbers of people in emergency and temporary housing, and about 700 applicants waiting on the social housing register. "Rental affordability has been a long-standing issue. Some whānau have struggled to find an affordable rental home, so they've been limited to emergency and social housing. "The new homes will complement RLC's new Rotorua Housing Plan to enable iwi and hapu housing aspirations, increase housing choice and support diverse housing needs. The plan was developed with extensive local engagement." Sign up for Ngā Pitopito Kōrero , a daily newsletter curated by our editors and delivered straight to your inbox every weekday.
