2021 Successful Projects
Co-Creating Housing Solutions: Enacting Opportunities for Individuals with Fetal Alcohol Spectrum Disorder
This Solutions Lab will address the barriers, strengths and opportunities for improving the housing tenure among youth with fetal alcohol spectrum disorder. Its innovative approach will engage youth with lived experience and blend an existing housing framework with community-based expertise to develop implementable solutions.
Advancing the Right to Housing for Women and Gender-Diverse Persons: Developing National Rights-Based Shelter Standard using a GBA+ Framework
This Solutions Lab brings together major Violence Against Women and homelessness stakeholders from across the country, It will explore a rights-based, gender-based analysis plus (GBA+) model for service delivery in emergency shelters. The Lab will co-develop and prototype “Rights-Based, GBA+ National Shelter Standards” to guide the transformation of service delivery.
Shelter in the Storm: Pathways to Generationally-Secure Housing in Southern New Brunswick
Skyrocketing property costs, overstretched social services and over 2 years of a pandemic have deepened housing barriers for vulnerable people. This Solutions Lab will co-develop solutions to improve housing accessibility and security in urban southern New Brunswick for people who need complex supports.
Supporting Saskatoon's Most Vulnerable: A Systems Approach to Individuals Facing an Intersection of Challenges
This Solutions Lab will focus on enhancing culturally appropriate and relevant support for people with complex needs. It will strengthen partnerships among housing support organizations. The project will co-develop a new way of working and collaborating that can have positive impacts in other areas of the community’s housing sector.
Gender Transformative Housing Supporting Women Leaving Violent Relationships: Co-creating Safe-at-Home Hamilton
“Safe at Home” programs enable women to stay in their homes while recovering from violence. The perpetrators of violence are relocated. This Solutions Lab challenges the conventional supports for women and children escaping violence by co-developing solutions for implementing the Safe at Home housing model in Canada.
LGBTQ Seniors Co-living Apartment
This Solutions Lab uses an innovative approach to better understand the unique life experiences of LGBTQ seniors. By better understanding their needs and the systems that influence their lived experience, this Lab will co-develop innovative and supportive solutions to housing for LBQT seniors.
Seniors' Hidden Housing Solutions
Many seniors are “over housed” in single-detached homes that are unaffordable and hard to maintain. This Solutions Lab will explore housing solutions for in-need seniors through home sharing, secondary suites and accessory dwellings. It will analyze challenges holistically by looking at issues such as social isolation, risk of homelessness, affordability and per capita greenhouse gas emissions. Best practices will inform the lab to co-develop policy and program solutions across British Columbia and Canada.
Toward Mutual Gain: Boosting Housing Supply by Unlocking Trapped Value in Racialized Neighborhoods
This Solution Lab will provide pathways to simplify, decentralize and accelerate the creation of housing. It aims to co-develop solutions and empower 300 property owners with the necessary tools and resources in a consolidated, user-friendly platform so they can each bring 1 unit to market within 18 to 24 months.
Green Violin Veterans Village Lab
This Solutions Lab will explore increasing the housing supply for low-income veterans who are disproportionately impacted by homelessness. This project will co-develop a faster and more affordable solution for housing and build an innovative modular tiny home community infill project.
Social Financing for Social Inclusion
This Solutions Lab will co-develop solutions for social isolation and the lack of inclusive housing options for people with developmental disabilities through a social financing model. This project aims to implement its solution(s) on a large, cross-country scale using community connectors or facilitators in existing housing.
Understanding and Estimating Hidden Homelessness in Saskatoon
This Solutions Lab will co-develop a framework that strengthens decision-maker understanding of hidden homelessness in Saskatoon. It will bring together people with lived experience and service providers with existing relationships with people experiencing homelessness. The project team will develop a framework for policy and decision-making that addresses the self-identified needs of hidden homeless populations.
Transforming Policy Responses to Homeless Encampments in Canada: Implementing a Rights-Based, GBA+ Approach
The National Protocol on Homeless Encampments in Canada – A Human Rights Approach Protocol is a series of rights-based principles. It is being increasingly used by municipalities, stakeholder groups and encampment residents. This Solutions Lab will co-develop an effective approach to fostering inter- and intra-governmental collaboration in response to encampments. It will build on the Protocol and implement it at the local level.
Mechanisms for Funnelling Institutional ESG funds into Affordable Housing Development Projects
This Solutions Lab will co-develop a platform that provides a consistent, comparable and transparent funding market for affordable housing projects. It uses environmental, social and governance (ESG) criteria to evaluate desired environmental, social and financial outcomes. It will enable the rapid scaling of private and institutional capital flows to projects and create stronger partnerships between developers, lenders, investors, regulators and the community.
Halal Housing Lab: Utilizing Untapped Restricted Philanthropic Capital to House Marginalized Ethno-Cultural Communities
Racialized, minority or newcomer women fleeing violence often need housing for larger and extended families, culturally appropriate supports for mental health and pathways into market housing that align with their values. This Solutions Lab aims to co-develop solutions to building affordable housing that meets their unique needs.
African Canadian Affordable Housing
This Solutions Lab will co-develop and deliver a more appropriate affordable housing solution for African Canadian communities. It will focus on creating a multigenerational affordable housing program that provides a traditional and sustainable environment for community members. It will give residents the necessary tools and support for success. Solutions will be transferable to communities with shared features.
2020 Successful Projects
A Home in a Neighbourhood Where I Belong
This Solutions Lab connects stakeholders from different sectors with people
with disabilities and their families. Participants identify challenges to
building inclusive housing. They share their knowledge and co-create and test
solutions for creating inclusive, affordable housing.
Nunavut Condominium Corporation Insurance Solutions Lab
This Solutions Lab works with our partners to identify and engage key
stakeholders exploring relevant issues and challenges with denied or expensive
building insurance. It also identifies and prototypes potential solutions to
this problem. The goal is to prevent loss of the structures and continue to
house vulnerable populations.
Affordable Housing for Social Inclusion
This Solutions Lab creates innovative, inclusive housing options for
individuals with developmental disabilities nationwide. Through a
collaborative process, potential solutions will be piloted. A key tool to be
built is a detailed journey/experience map of the process for developing new
housing that could embed the principles of "reverse inclusion".
Creating Home Together: Supporting Women+ Through Housing Transitions
This Solutions Lab creates a roadmap on solutions to remove barriers to
shelters and other services in the homelessness and violence against women
sectors. Women and transgender people with lived expertise and nationwide
partners will participate in workshops. The ideas and materials generated will
help to develop adaptable housing and support solutions.
Housing Journeys Reimagined: Toward a Supportive Affordable Homeownership
Opportunity
The Solutions Lab aims to introduce a new supportive, affordable ownership
model that can help end chronic homelessness and generational poverty. The
replication of this model across Canada would help decrease chronic
homelessness by increasing options for affordable, stable housing. This
approach could also reduce returns to homelessness by developing a wealth- and
equity-generating opportunity for individuals experiencing homelessness.
Housing through an Autism Lens: A Pathway from Crisis to Solutions
The Solutions Lab develops a pathway to independent and affordable living for
autistic adults. It includes an integrated set of flexible housing-related
supports and services (based on functional ability and the spectrum of Autism
Spectrum Disorder or ASD needs). It also proposes actual brick and mortar
solutions.
Building with Mission
This Solutions Lab tries to reduce pressures on hospitals and long-term care
homes by determining and addressing the causes. The key is to impact social
determinants of health and creating housing based on local needs. The goal is
to create a collaborative playbook by documenting insights and learnings to
develop affordable and supportive housing campuses.
Developing easy-to-use community decision-making tools to help achieve
National Housing Strategy Goals
This Solutions lab opens the perceived black box of housing data to be easily
used by decision makers. This project will be completed through a series of
online workshops. The result will be a better understanding of the initial
problems that will allow us to provide and support evidence-based consensus on
solutions. It will also help teams to assess end-results for accountability,
and identify further innovative opportunities.
2019 Successful Projects
Medicine Hat Systems Transformation Solutions Lab
The Solutions Lab will examine how to co-design a Systems Transformation
Initiative that results in an integrated prevention, homelessness, housing,
corrections, and health systems design and transformation process.
Balanced Housing Lab
The Solutions Lab will examine the emerging housing issues facing
middle-income earners to be able to live and work within the City of North
Vancouver, Squamish Nation, and District of West Vancouver.
Indigenous Housing Solutions Lab
The Solutions Lab will examine solutions to answer the question: What if we
could co-create Indigenous homes to be sources of health, wealth and
connection in tune with culture and the environment?
Surfacing our Strengths
The Solutions Lab will examine cross-sectoral, culturally appropriate,
person-centered responses to housing needs and experiences of homelessness for
women+. This includes women and people of marginalized gender identities
(herein: “women+”) experiencing homelessness – including women+ and children
fleeing violence.
Indigenous Housing and Home-Lands Solutions Lab
The Solutions Lab will examine the economic development and employment
opportunity related to a growing Indigenous population with legally recognized
territorial assets and capital, and a need for housing.
Let’s Talk… Home and Community
The Solutions Lab will examine the Question: How might we promote social and
economic inclusion through a housing model with individuals with developmental
disabilities and newcomers to Canada by leveraging existing community assets
and hosting conversations for each group to co-design “good community”?
From Prison to Homelessness: Ending a Perilous Trajectory
The Solutions Lab will examine how we can help increase the availability and
access to suitable housing for Canadians who leave the prison system, while
also providing opportunities for offenders to gain employment skills training
to improve their opportunities of finding meaningful employment.
Affordable Housing Hackathon Solutions Lab
The Solutions Lab will examine new and practical solutions to the construction
of more affordable housing stock by removing barriers and opening new paths
for innovation in planning, construction and regulation so that private
industry and the not-for-profit industry can meet the needs of the community.
Community Studios
The Solutions Lab will examine the creation of a new model of supportive and
shared modular housing.
Housing Financialization
(Directed Solutions Lab)
In partnership with the Social Innovation Institute, this directed Solutions
Lab will explore the financialization of housing.
2018 Successful Projects
Affordable Housing Renewal
The Solutions Lab will develop net zero or net-zero ready retrofit design
options and prototype 4 to 6 low-rise wood-frame multi-unit residential
buildings.
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