How Arnprior is tackling the town’s homelessness issue with a tiny house community and more

Homelessness is very much a reality in the town of Arnprior, and councillor Lynn Grinstead is hoping she can help shine a light on the issue.

Among the ideas being shopped around is a tiny home community. It would be considered a respite community that would be available for people to live in as they wait for community housing.

“In a community like ours with such a limited number of affordable housing, I think this would be a great thing,” Grinstead said. “I think this would be a grand opportunity. But are hurdles to get over because zoning bylaws would need to change and Arnprior doesn’t have a lot of vacant land anymore to develop.”

The proposed community was put in as a recommendation in the report that would be looked at by the town’s newly formed committee council of homelessness, which will be forming next year.

Grinstead says the tiny house community would be one of the recommendations they’d seek out help for to get done.

Another one would be to create a “one hub” where services can be more readily accessible in one place and help connect people to all the services they would need.

Living below the poverty line a situation the councillor can relate to, and she had to go through it with her two kids.

“Years and years ago I’ve had that experience because I was in a relationship that wasn’t doing well and I had to go to social services,” Grinstead recalled.

So with her experience, she helped form a report with 52 recommendations for the committee on homeless — a report that hopes will help fight homelessness in Arnprior.

Correction: An earlier version of the story was worded in a way that sounded like Lynn Grinstead was once homeless. She was, instead, living below the poverty line. She was going through a separation from her marriage, and didn't have a job at the time.