How 8 Ontario cities have little to show for $2.6M social housing software

In 2011, London acted as the lead of eight municipalities to develop custom social housing software. As of 2023, the software is only partially rolled out in two of them.

A custom housing software in development for more than a decade and costing more than $2.6 million has only been partially rolled out in two of the eight Ontario municipalities that pushed for it, while one municipality has completely dropped out of the project.

Following an inquiry by local media, city staff in London, Ont., are providing more details about the fledgling project and planning to provide regular updates going forward — London city council last received a project update in February 2015.

The province downloaded responsibility for administering and funding most social housing, or community housing, in 2000 and in 2011, expanded the responsibilities and powers of municipal service managers under the Housing Services Act.

The idea for the custom software project began in December 2011 with London taking the lead to form a consortium of service managers with Windsor, Hamilton, Waterloo, Chatham-Kent, York, Halton and Ottawa, dubbed the Housing Collaborative Initiative (HCI).

The project was confirmed in 2014 when the regions’ service managers “signed an agreement to design, procure, develop and implement housing software to move from local Excel-based and paper-based tracking systems to one that consolidates the business information related to waitlists, rent supplement and housing providers in a consistent format,” London’s new director of municipal housing development Matt Feldberg explained.

In the ensuing decade, Hamilton and Waterloo have partially rolled out the software while York has exited the consortium entirely.

London currently has “a version” of the software and is “undertaking preliminary assessment prior to embarking on a full testing plan,” city staff said.

“(Hamilton and Waterloo) have actually offered to help us with some of the findings they’ve had, lessons learned, and what they’ve implemented,” Feldberg said Tuesday.