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Feds respond to Hamilton’s funding request for refugee housing

The federal government has responded to the City of Hamilton’s request for more funding to house and support refugees and asylum seekers.
Mayor Andrea Horwath sent a letter on July 25 to then Immigration Minister Sean Fraser saying Hamilton’s emergency response systems are at the “risk of collapse” due to an alarming rise in refugees and asylum seekers within shelters.
CHCH News has learned Minister Marc Miller, who was shuffled into the Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship profile last week, has begun talks with the City.
The exact details of that response have not been released, but Miller is calling on all levels of government to come to the table on this issue.
WATCH MORE: Hamilton asks feds for $9M reimbursement, funding for refugee shelter
Horwath called on Ottawa to provide over $9 million in immediate funding to help cover the costs, saying the City cannot foot the bill on its own.
Half of the $9 million would be used to repay Hamilton and the other half would cover the remainder of the year.
“The City of Hamilton is currently spending $6 million annually in hotel overflow costs to keep families housed, even as our encampment population has grown to 165 this year from 35 in June of last year,” Horwath wrote in the letter last week.
She added that the city’s emergency shelter system has housed 509 people with refugee and asylum seeker status since January and 202 in the last week alone.
Horwath also said Hamilton’s four shelter providers for women and children fleeing violence are seeing a high volume of refugees, who at times have accounted for approximately 60 per cent of their total space.
“The financial impact of these policies cannot be downloaded to local governments, and these individuals and families cannot continue to suffer while federal and provincial governments fight to avoid responsibility for their care,” Horwath wrote.
She is also asking for:
- A streamlined program to provide committed, up-front funding to municipalities for the housing and support of refugees and asylum seekers.
- A federally-funded reception centre for refugee claimants at Pearson International Airport, as requested by Toronto Mayor Olivia Chow.
- Proactive and sustained housing funding to cities that matches the projected impacts of national refugee and immigration policies.
READ MORE: Ottawa gives $212M funding boost for housing asylum seekers