Widespread homelessness and lack of access to adequate housing in a country as affluent as Canada is clearly one of the most critical human rights issues facing all levels of government.

Social Planning Toronto has joined other community organizations and advocates as a signatory to an open letter to Prime Minister Justin Trudeau and Jean-Yves Duclos, Minister of Families, Children and Social Development, asking them to embed the right to housing in the National Housing Strategy legislation currently being drafted.

Over 130,000 people — a population the size of a small city — do not speak English and face everyday challenges navigating life in the city, a new report from Social Planning Toronto finds. The report finds these residents have diverse and complex language learning needs.

“This population is big, and their needs are as diverse as their stories and backgrounds,” said Peter Clutterbuck, Interim Executive Director of Social Planning Toronto. “These residents are our neighbours, from the young mother at the local park caring for small children, to the grandmother next door — being able to speak English would make a big difference in their quality of life, from finding a good job to accessing services in their community.”

A message from Peter Clutterbuck:

It is with great sadness that I learned that Karen Liberman passed away on Thursday, May 24^th, 2018. Karen was a long-time community activist, planner, workshop presenter and facilitator.

Critics say budget process is badly broken— not equipped to tackle city’s ‘big issues’.

As Toronto City Council prepares to make its final decision on its 2018 budget, a new report by Social Planning Toronto reveals it will fall short by $36 million on funding council’s own pledges on housing, climate change, transit, and poverty reduction.

Wealthy developers will not likely end up helping to pay for affordable housing under new regulations proposed by Ontario’s Minister of Housing, say over 60 community organizations and housing experts. The regulations effectively reverse policy aimed at ensuring developers build affordable housing with each new development— a measure called ‘Inclusionary Zoning’.

Children in the Toronto region and their families’ incomes are deeply divided along race, a new report finds.

Based on 2016 Census data, the report shows that Toronto region children from racialized families— families of people of colour— are twice as likely to be living in poverty compared to children in non-racialized families (25.3 % compared to 11.4%). The report also found that Indigenous families with children are experiencing an extremely high poverty rate of 84%.

We would like to extend our congratulations to Black Lives Matter – Toronto for their winning of the NOW Magazine’s Readers’ Choice "Best Social Justice Group". We couldn’t be prouder to place second to such a committed and effective group.

Responding to a new report released by the United Way of Toronto and York Region, Sean Meagher, Executive Director of Social Planning Toronto, called for public action to counter Toronto’s rising economic inequality:

“The report outlines an overwhelmingly divided City, created by a failure to invest adequately in our neighbourhoods and residents,” said Meagher. “With one-in-four children living in poverty, we have to do better”.

As school returns, Toronto’s students and parents are still coping with a legacy of ‘streaming', finds a new report by Social Planning Toronto. In the process of ‘streaming’, students are grouped into either academic or applied courses, with big impacts on post-secondary options and life outcomes. Unfortunately, evidence shows streaming is impacted by a variety of factors, including neighbourhood and socio-economic factors.

Toronto’s downtown and waterfront condos are now home to thousands of preschool-aged children, finds a new report by Social Planning Toronto. The report reveals the number of preschool-aged children in key downtown census neighbourhoods has more than doubled in ten years—a staggering shift that has childcare and recreation programs overcrowded as the school year comes to a close.