The City of Saint John will try again to secure federal funding for affordable housing projects in the city.
Council recently directed staff to work with non-profits on a “coordinated municipal-led application” to the Rapid Housing Initiative (RHI).
The grant program, which is led by Canada Mortgage Housing Corporation, is a funding program for the construction of affordable housing projects.
Municipal governments and non-profits can apply for new construction and conversion/rehabilitation projects that will establish new affordable housing units for at least 20 years.
“The City of Saint John is able to form a partnership with non-profit organizations who have projects that meet the RHI eligibility criteria,” said a staff report to council.
“The City would submit an application for the RHI on behalf of these organizations, which will enable the selected local projects. The benefit of this approach is primarily reduced application requirements.”
Non-profits would be required to submit eligible projects for assessment and selection for inclusion in the city-led application.
Projects that are not selected would be encouraged to apply independently for the grant program, said the report.
Former city manager John Collin told council in late November that the city plans to apply for “easily well over $5 million of various projects.”
“Our target is to achieve three to five sound projects, well articulated, well reasoned, showing clear potential and gain on the affordable housing front,” said Collin, who has since retired.
Council also approved using up to $25,000 from the city’s Affordable Housing Action Reserve to support the hiring of a consultant to prepare the city’s application.
Staff believe that temporary additional resources are needed “due to the technical requirements of the application, and the amount of work required to obtain necessary information from our non-profit development community to submit a successful application.”
City staff plan to submit an application by the end of January.
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