Advocates say that people want to protest about the housing crisis, but there are still a number of problems
Tenants in several buildings in Toronto’s west end who are on strike because their rents went up a lot say they have gotten a lot of support from all over the country.
Bruno Dobrusin, an organizer for the York South-Weston Tenant Union, said that support for their rent strike has been “overwhelming.” He said that not only are people listening, but they also want to learn how to organize themselves.
“It’s a hopeful sign that people are rising up and fighting back,” Dobrusin said.
“We’re seeing that people want bigger movements more and more. But now the question is, “How can we help each other on a state or national level?”
Advocates like Dobrusin say that Canadians who can’t get into the country’s tight housing market may be more likely to think about organizing as a way to get the housing crisis fixed.
People say there is a desire for change, which could lead to a large-scale movement to make housing more affordable and accessible. However, organizers and residents face enough problems to keep the movement from getting off the ground.
Ricardo Tranjan, a political economist at the Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives, a research group in Ottawa, said, “People don’t see any changes or improvements year after year.”
Since 2021, rents have been steadily going up across the country, and last month they hit a record high. Urbanation, a real estate research company, says that the average asking rent for all of the United States was $2,042 in June. This was more than the previous record, which was set in November 2022.
“I think people are starting to be more open to the idea that ideas and technical solutions are not the missing link. “What’s missing is the political will to change, and that will take some pressure,” said Trajan.
WATCH | Since last year, the average price in Canada has gone up by 10%:
Should there be a big housing movement
Even though Canadians who live in unstable housing may be unhappy, that doesn’t mean that no new homes are being built.
Canada has been building more homes in recent years, according to the Canada Mortgage and Housing Corporation (CMHC). In 2022, over 240,000 new homes will be built, which is just a little less than the record high of 244,000 units built in 2021. Statistics Canada data also shows that in Toronto and Vancouver, two of the hottest markets in the country, housing stock growth will be faster than population growth from 2019 to 2021.
But CMHC has said that Canada is still short on supply at the current rate of building. It says that almost 19 million housing units will be added to the market by 2030, but that’s 3.5 million units short of “housing affordability for everyone living in Canada.”
Mary Rowe, president and chief executive officer of the Canadian Urban Institute research group, said that it doesn’t matter how many units are being built as much as what kind and where they are.
“The pattern of development has gone where the highest rate of return is,” said Rowe. As private developer housing took off, there was a push toward single-family and detached homes. In the 1990s, when the federal government ended its social housing programs, that was a big reason why.
She said it left a real lack of affordable, family, and supportive housing, as well as different ways to rent or buy, like co-ops, rent-to-own, and shared ownership.
“Here in Canada, we need to get smart and figure out what changes we need to make to keep a kind of balance and make that ecosystem healthy and full of choices.”
Even though not everyone has a calling to be an activist, Rowe said that it makes sense that some people will join social movements to be “engaged in the quality of our communities.”
Rowe said, “There are people with a lot of anger and people who have been hurt by the way the housing market has been run for decades.”
“Now is the time for us all to look at what needs to be done to fix that.”
What is keeping people from helping
Even though there may be a desire for change, it’s hard for residents and people who want to organize to tap into it.
Alejandra Ruiz Vargas, a national leader with the Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now (ACORN), said that since its founding in 2004, the group has been working on issues like housing, fair banking, and access to the internet.
She said that it opened new chapters in Calgary and Waterloo, Ontario, last year to meet demand, bringing the total number of members to over 140,000 across the country.
Vargas said that they are happy about the growth, but they are still working in a system where many people are too tired or busy to get involved and actively feel “defeat” about their ability to change Canadian politics.
“Right now, some people have to work three jobs just to get by. So, when do you really have to show up?”
Vargas said that no matter how bad things look, they need to keep spreading their message.
“We’re going to keep fighting, give it our all, and do our best,” Vargas said, giving the examples of tenant information sessions, social media campaigns, and door-knocking blitzes.
WATCH | How low-income Canadians are affected by the housing market:
How do you get people to join a cause
Tranjan said that if more people talked about politization, the financialization of politics, and the lack of housing regulations, more people might want to get involved.
“There are actually people who are trying to make things worse because they make a lot of money off of tenant families right now,” said Tranjan, giving the examples of weakening rent control and tenant protections.
“We need to talk like adults. Stop acting like supply and demand are the only things that matter.”
For Dobrusin, the fight goes on locally by getting people to talk to their neighbors and start thinking about what they can do together.
On Saturday, he and the other organizers want to do just that. Together with supporters, trade unions, and community groups, tenants are marching down Toronto’s Weston Road to the offices of their local MPPs and MPs to ask for fair rent and accountability from landlords.
“Whether you’re on a rent strike or not, it’s important to join those forces,” he said.
“I hope that we can use that to make something bigger.”