Kusmierczyk defends federal program that houses asylum claimants

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Windsor-Tecumseh MP Irek Kusmierczyk says the federal government is now looking for cost-sharing partners as a way to house asylum claimants moving forward.

Earlier this week, Windsor mayor Drew Dilkens sounded the alarm, explaining that a federal program that houses at least 840 asylum claimants in two Windsor hotels, was changing and shifting financial and resource responsibilities to municipalities and provinces.

All asylum claimants in Windsor were issued departure notices by the Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Canada (IRCC), with the remaining due out by Mar. 3.

Dilkens told reporters these changes place significant pressure back on the city’s emergency shelter system.

Speaking on AM800’s The Shift with Patty Handysides, Kusmierczyk said that the program was brought in as a temporary emergency measure to deal with an influx of claimants coming from Quebec.

He says claimants have always had a maximum of six months available to them in hotels before needing to find housing for themselves within the community.

“Some of those asylum seekers, some of them will settle in our community, but some of them will move on to Toronto, to Vancouver, to London and elsewhere because they are free to move within the community,” said Kusmierczyk. “So we’re winding down that emergency program.”

The city received $106,000 under the Interim Housing Assistance Program (IHAP) for expenses related to these claimants and will apply again by Jan. 31 to recover 2024 costs.

Kusmierczyk says the federal government introduced IHAP as a way to help communities and organizations recoup costs.

“We stood up this program, this grant program called IHAP, we provided $1.1 billion over the next three years, and it’s a grant program like any other grant program where we’re stepping up, but we’re also asking the provinces, the municipality and also local organizations to step up with cost sharing, with providing some of the funding for that program,” he said.

According to Kusmierczyk, that doesn’t necessarily mean the City of Windsor would have to start contributing. He says the government is looking for partners.

“The cost share doesn’t have to come from the municipality, it can come from the provinces for example,” Kusmierczyk said. “So if the provinces decided that they want to be the main partner with the federal government on this, municipalities wouldn’t be on the hook. The provinces could pick up the five per cent, or the 20 per cent of the cost sharing for everyone.”

City council will be presented with a report on Monday Jan. 27, with administration recommending against applying for the new IHAP funding due to the cost-sharing requirements and lack of federal funding after 2027.

Instead, administration will suggest that council advocate for long-term federal funding that does not require municipal cost-sharing.

Under the current federal funding model, the city and the province would be required to contribute a combined five per cent of program costs in the first year, 25 per cent in the second year, and 100 per cent of the costs by 2027 and beyond.

— Dustin Coffman, Meagan Delaurier/AM800 News