'Sigh of relief': Cambridge gets provincial cash for meeting housing targets after initially being denied

After a long year of conversations and number crunching, Cambridge announced that it has officially been awarded $4.44 million in funding from a provincial housing project after first being told that it didn't hit the mark. 

Ontario's Building Faster Fund is a three-year, $1.2 billion fund. It required municipalities to hit 80 per cent of their target for housing unit creation in 2023 in order to qualify for funding.

Kitchener received $14 million from this fund, while Guelph received $4.68 million. 

Cambridge was initially told it did not qualify for funding. Deputy city manager Hardy Bromberg and related staff, however, disagreed and started crunching the numbers. A news release last Thursday announced that they were successful in proving that the numbers had been incorrect. 

"It was quite disappointing because, according to our statistics, we had met 88 per cent of the target," said Bromberg. 

City staff soon realized the discrepancy was due to additional residential units, or ARUs. 

"That might be a basement apartment or upstairs apartment, or a tiny home in your backyard," said Bromberg. 

The province only counted 75 permits for ARUs, but Cambridge had actually issued permits for 250 of them. 

Bromberg said advocating for the money meant a lot of conversations between the city and Canadian Mortgage and Housing Corporation to review the numbers – as well as many talks between Mayor Jan Liggett and Minister of Municipal Affairs and Housing Paul Calandra.

"And I'll give kudos to the province because they were willing to listen and look at the numbers, and set up a working group," said Bromberg. 

Cambridge city staff were a part of that working group responsible for making sure the numbers were indeed accurate. 

According to a news release from Mayor Jan Liggett, as of Oct. 25, city housing numbers and funding were confirmed. 

"We were very confident with the stats that we have, but until the province recognized that, there is always a little bit of room for doubt," said Bromberg. "It was a sigh of relief."

In the release, Liggett notes that she is grateful for the partnership with the Ontario government and "will be utilizing the money for infrastructure projects throughout the community in order to achieve our shared goals."

Bromberg said that much of the money will be going toward offsetting the cost of growth in the community, like road reconstruction and repaving. 

"Housing starts for 2024 have been quite low, but the city is still very active in dealing with other kinds of growth," said Bromberg. "It's not just about growing a community in terms of housing, it's also about jobs."