How is Public Housing These Days? Residualization, Financial Precarity, and Dilapidation in Toronto and Montréal’s Public Housing Sector (2007-2021)

This paper hopes to fill in the literature and knowledge gap on recent conditions and trends within the public housing sector in Canada. To narrow the focus, two things were done. The public housing agencies of Toronto (Toronto Community Housing Corporation) and Montréal (Office municipal d’habitation de Montréal) were chosen as case studies. Then, a review literature review of recent publications was used to identify three major trends in the wider social housing sector: increasing residualization, financial precarity, and dilapidation. The research looks at how these agencies fit (or do not fit) these trends identified. Agency and municipal publications, interviews, and e-mail correspondences were utilized to spearhead conclusions. It was discovered that the TCHC and OMHM fit into these trends, although recent

funding commitments have created change, at least in the short term. Various recommendations, from careful social mixing strategies to a dedicated municipal tax, were discussed as potential ways to address these issues. This research may help guide public and social housing policy and research for other jurisdictions, as well as in future region- and systems-wide reviews of public and social housing in Ontario and Québec.