Developer paying ten-year lease on Pickering farmhouse converted to a home for the homeless
Published October 10, 2024 at 4:36 pm
Seven formerly homeless people now living in a farm house in Pickering abandoned after the Greenbelt land swap reversal learned at the grand opening of the community-led project that their rent is covered by the landlord for the entirety of the ten-year lease.
The home at 690 Concession Road 3 has been transformed into a home – and a working farm of sorts – for seven people, thanks to community volunteers, local governments and an army of community volunteers who made it happen.
The doors of the home were thrown open to the public Thursday (on World Homeless Day), with the community getting a chance to meet their new neighbours and get a look at the first project of its kind in Canada.
TACC Developments – a real estate and construction giant and one of the biggest landowners in Ontario – was approached by Pickering Councillor Maurice Brenner and DARS, a volunteer-led community outreach initiative that aims to serve low-income families and individuals experiencing housing instability in the city, about donating the land in the spring.
TACC, who had plans to develop the seven-acre property for housing until Premier Doug Ford reversed his controversial Greenbelt land swap deal late last year, agreed and announced at Thursday’s opening that they would cover the lease – about $70,000 – for the ten-year term.
Brenner said the lease arrangements were originally just to cover the property taxes.
“For TACC to step up it shows they want to find solutions to homelessness in our city.”
Several hundred people showed up at the opening, with visitors seeing how the residents were living in the seven-bedroom home and how they were raising chickens and goats and growing produce to support the operation.
The cost of the project came in at about $200,000, with casino revenue and various government grants (along with private donations) allowing the conversion to happen without any tax dollars spent.
The lands donated by TACC Developments and the De Gasperis family are found in the bottom right of this graphic