In collaboration with service organizations across the city, PATH proposes a sustainable plan to transition some people out of chronic homelessness and into permanent supportive housing.  We need your support to make this happen.  Here are some facts about the program to bring you up to date.

In November 2022, PATH presented an outline of a program to Council.  We have since conducted a pre-consultation with City planning (April 2023), secured a lease on a property at 385 Lansdowne (August 2023), and completed a temporary zoning application (February 2024) which will come before Council by August 2024 (projected). We have consolidated relationships with The Elizabeth Fry Society, the Brock Mission and Habitat for Humanity PKR.

We are renovating the property to provide spacious, hospitable dining and meeting rooms for life-enhancing opportunities, including a hair salon and a gym to promote wellness and self-care; the outdoor space will include garden beds. We plan for 24/7 staffing. All operations involve collaboration with existing service providers as well as our trained volunteers and the PATH residents.

Brian, a recently unhoused Peterborough citizen, visits the sleeping cabin village in Kitchener.

As we already see with the Bridges project at Wolfe Street, temporary housing with supports does increase public safety and can offer substantial health benefits. Reports state that people who are housed experience declines in their contact with justice services as well as improved health outcomes, with lower dependence on emergency care.  Harm reduction measures reduce the risk of overdoses and death from toxic drug supply.

PATH has a secure private funding model for a two-phase Permanent Supportive Housing program.

Phase 1:

A 3-year transitional housing project at 385 Lansdowne St, will cost $18,500 per person per year.  As of Feb. 2024, through generous community support,  27% of this funding has been secured.  Numerous community groups have offered additional start up capital support. Resident contribution will provide up to 30% of funding.  We were able to raise $260,000 in five months of fundraising in 2023, and we have a clearly delineated fundraising plan for the next three years. Private fundraising during FY 2025-2027 at a rate consistent with current progress will be sufficient to meet the needs of the PATH program.

Phase 2:

A successor program funded through a social financing model and in collaboration with other organizations to create managed permanent supportive housing through real estate investment and community collaboration.

PATH expects to rapidly transition many individuals out of chronic homelessness in an affordable sleeping cabin community. The site at 385 Lansdowne has space for 24 cabins, and with your support we will have them up and functioning before the end of this year. A place to live with supports leads to stabilization of individuals, the majority of whom will continue to choose permanent supportive housing when it can be offered.

“I would like to live in a tiny home community,” says Terry, a formerly unhoused hardworking citizen who supports himself by delivering papers and recycling bottles and cans.

PATH is sustainable and scalable.  The results of a 3-year sleeping cabin project will build relationships with people with lived experience and partner agencies, informing the development of permanent supportive housing for our most vulnerable citizens.  Affordable accessory dwelling units, congregate private housing and tiny homes can be implemented across the region to provide a permanent housing option for residents of the Phase 1 project and others who are unhoused.  An increasing number of NFP-owned and managed housing units can enrich our current housing stock.