Housing First is an approach that focuses on moving people who are chronically and episodically homeless as rapidly as possible from the street or emergency shelters into permanent housing with supports that vary according to participant need. The supports are provided by a Housing First Case Manager, who serves as a main point of contact for the participant form assessment to follow-up and who is provided back-up support by a Housing First Case Supervisor, Housing First Specialist and a community of practice.
The Landlord Damage Fund is a discretionary fund created for landlords who work with our Regional Housing First Program. This discretionary fund is meant to protect landlords properties while working with us to house those in our community that are chronically or episodically homeless. The following points are the highlights of the program:
- The Landlord Damage Fund is available to landlords that are providing tenancy to participants of the Regional Housing First Program for eligible damages caused by the tenant.
- The purpose of the Damage Fund is to reimburse landlords for the cost of eligible damages done to their property by a tenant, which may in turn prevent the tenant from being evicted and returning to homelessness.
- Where a tenant has left a unit after having caused what would be deemed eligible damages, Empower Simcoe may reimburse the landlord for costs incurred should this mean the landlord could be retained as a provider of low-cost housing for other participants of The Regional Housing First Program.
- In order to determine whether a claim should be paid, Empower Simcoe requires certain information as to the condition of the unit both before and after damage occurs. Housing First Case Managers are responsible for documenting the condition of the unit at move-in and move-out, and providing a copy to the landlord, so Empower Simcoe will have some documentation of the unit’s condition, should the landlord later make a claim for.
- If the landlord chooses to make an upgrade while repairing the damage, the difference between the cost of a repair and the chosen upgrade will be at the landlord’s expense. For example, if a tenant broke a window and the landlord wants to upgrade the window while replacing it, estimates must be provided to Empower Simcoe for both replacements of the previous quality of window and the upgraded quality. Empower Simcoe will only reimburse up to the cost of the previous quality window.