Toronto Final Report: At Home/Chez Soi project

Homelessness is an ongoing social and economic problem that affects thousands of Canadians. In Toronto, Canada’s most populous city, more than 5,000 individuals are homeless on any given night and in 2008 approximately 28,000 unique individuals used homeless shelters over the course of the year. Housing First has emerged as an evidence-based practice for meeting the unique needs of this population.

This report describes findings from the Toronto site of the At Home/Chez Soi project. Unique contextual and developmental features are also discussed, including an intervention that provides ethnoracial Intensive Case Management (ER-ICM) to better address the needs of individuals from ethnoracial backgrounds who are homeless. Prior to the initiation of the At Home/Chez Soi project, Toronto already had a wide array of services for people who are homeless and/or have a mental illness. The involvement of people with lived experience of homelessness and mental health problems (PWLE) in the planning, development, and execution of the study was another key feature of the Toronto site.