City of Ottawa receives $37.5M cheque for meeting provincial housing targets
Posted Apr 5, 2024 12:10:57 PM.
Last Updated Apr 5, 2024 02:06:23 PM.
Premier Doug Ford is handing over a $37,502,947 cheque to the City of Ottawa.
The money is part of the Building Faster Fund, and comes in exchange for meeting at least 80 per cent of provincial housing targets.
Ford says Ottawa made substantial progress last year, breaking ground on 10,313 new housing units.
During a news conference Friday, the premier was asked how he could help Ottawa build even more.
“We’re giving every tool we possibly can,” Ford said.
“No one knows better than the municipalities. Not the federal government, not the province, but the municipalities. (They) know where they should build, and where they shouldn’t.”
He added, he had all the confidence he would be coming back next year “with a much larger cheque.”
Ottawa Mayor Mark Sutcliffe says the funding will go towards building not just homes, but communities.
“As the city is growing, we need more support for infrastructure. We’ve made that clear to the provincial government and they’ve been listening, and we are making that clear to the federal government as well,” Sutcliffe said.
“We need more water and sewer, we need more roads, we need more transit to be able to build these communities, so I think this is a big help today.”
The Ford government has set a goal of constructing 1.5 million new homes by 2031.
In February, Toronto also received $114-million for exceeding its 2023 housing targets.
