The County of Wellington received a funding boost for its homelessness initiatives Friday.
Guelph MP Lloyd Longfield and Wellington County warden Kelly Linton were on hand at the county's social service office on Wyndham Street to announce the county is getting $1.49 million over the next five years.
The county administers housing programs for all the county, including the City of Guelph.
The new money is through the federal government's Reaching Home program, a community-based program that sees funds given directly to local municipalities and service providers.
The money is a big increase over the $65,000 the county was receiving for this stream.
"That's such a small amount of money when you're talking about housing and housing services, so this is a big increase we're getting now,"said Jane Londerville, who chairs the Community Advisory Board, which decides how funding is allocated.
The money will not be used to build new housing, but to improve and enhance current homelessness programs and perhaps help fund new ones.
Including helping people who managed to obtain housing to stay in that housing, providing the supports needed to maintain housing.
"To work with the landlords and get the supports they need in staying in housing, which is preventing homelessness, basically," Londerville said.
In the fall the advisory board will sit down and come up with a plan for the money.
"More people will be helped," Londerville said.
"The next steps is really looking at what our community needs and building a community plan and setting our priorities for the additional funding," lsaid Lori Richards, housing stability manager for the County of Wellington,
"People are getting the supports they need to be successful when they get a housing unit and they're not having to go to six different people to piece together the supports that they need," Londerville said.
Reaching Home is part of a national housing strategy that will see the feds spend $40 billion over the next 10 years, including $2.2 billion over 10 years towards homelessness.
"Reaching Home will support communities to shift towards the outcomes-based group approach. It will help keep decision making where it should be, at the local level, and give communities greater flexibitility to address local priorities," Longfield said.
Linton said it's essential for all levels of government to work together.
"Homelessness in Wellington County and Guelph is a sad situation and we have to do something about it," Linton said. "It's so important that all levels work together to make sure that we solve this issue."
