Sault, Sudbury, North Bay exceed housing targets for 2023

Sault Ste. Marie is well on its way to meeting an Ontario government-assigned target of building 1,500 new homes by 2031.

The province's housing tracker shows the city had 213 housing starts last year, exceeding its 2023 target by 194 per cent.

Meeting the commitment is a requirement to getting access to the province's Building Faster Fund — a $1.2-billion pool of cash aimed at helping municipalities meet Premier Doug Ford's goal of 1.5 million new homes by 2031.

If Sault Ste. Marie meets the target, it'll get $1.2 million in three annual payments of $400,000.

If the city achieves 110 per cent of its 1,500-home target, it'll collect a sweet $1,440,000.

If it manages just 80 per cent of target, the City of Sault Ste. Marie's payout will be reduced to $960,000.

For purposes of eligibility, the target of 1,500 homes by 2031 is counted from 2022.

"In the coming weeks, the province will announce Building Faster Fund rewards for all municipalities that met, exceeded or achieved 80 per cent of their assigned housing targets in 2023," Premier Ford said in a news release last week.

"Any unspent funding will be made available for housing-enabling infrastructure to all municipalities, including those that have already received funding as a result of reaching their targets, through an application process.

"In addition, 10 per cent — or $120 million — of the Building Faster Fund is being set aside for small, rural and northern municipalities to help build housing-enabling infrastructure and prioritize projects that speed up the increase of housing supply," the release said.

Ontario's 50 largest municipalities were assigned housing targets.

Of those 50 municipalities, 19 exceeded their targets, including the Sault and all three of the other northern Ontario cities assigned targets.

Greater Sudbury beat its 2023 target by 156 per cent, North Bay by 277 per cent and Thunder Bay by 124 per cent.

The following, as posted on the province's housing tracker website, is the target status of all 50 municipalities with assigned housing targets.

Cities listed as being 'on track' achieved 80 per cent of their 2023 targets.