The Ford government is mum on whether it will continue to update a once-signature housing tracker less than three years after first introducing it as an attempt to motivate municipal governments to build homes faster.
In August 2023, the Ford government began setting targets for the number of new homes in towns and cities around Ontario, promising them extra cash if they met those goals.
“We have made substantial progress in our work to get more homes built faster across Ontario and I look forward to working together to build the homes Ontarians need and deserve,” then housing minister Steve Clark.
The government set up an online tracker to share how cities were faring in reaching their goals and to allow it to add its own definitions for new housing.
In the months and years that followed, the government added long-term care beds, basements, garden suites, student dorm rooms and retirement homes to the definition of a new home as it tried to reach a goal of 1.5 million new homes by 2031.
Its tracker was initially updated regularly and cities that reached — or got close to —their targets were rewarded with giant cheques and cash.
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But as time has passed, and the Progressive Conservatives’ election promise of 1.5 million new homes has faded to a near-impossibility, the tracker appears to have been dropped.
Internal documents previously obtained by Global News show the government finished its tabulated data for new homes built in 2024 by February 2025.
It waited until August to publish data which showed that, even after adding long-term care and student beds, it had failed to hit its self-imposed target.
Now, the government is once again handing cheques to municipalities that hit their housing targets, while its tracker remains dormant.
The Ministry of Municipal Affairs and Housing has not responded to questions from Global News about whether it still plans to update its tracker, which still shows data from 2024.
“Ontario is in last place when it comes to building homes, and yet, Doug Ford refuses to have a plan to change that,” Ontario NDP Leader Marit Sties said in a statement.
“The Premier doesn’t want to release the numbers because he doesn’t want to admit that his attempts at housing policy have failed again. Doug Ford has had eight years to figure it out, and Ontario is further behind than when he first took office. It’s shameful.”
The lack of updates to the tracker comes close to a year after Municipal Affairs and Housing Minister Rob Flack has suggested he is considering changes to the three-year fund in its final year.
Last summer, he told the Association of Municipalities of Ontario conference in Ottawa that he would consult with mayors and the association to “extend and improve” the Building Faster Fund.
“That includes ensuring the fund reflects the new market we are in, as well as encouraging municipalities to cut development charges and get shovels in the ground faster on key infrastructure projects,” he said.
The finance minister has since accepted the 1.5 million homes plan is now a “soft target” and Flack himself has sounded increasingly non-committal on whether Ontario will hit the goal.
“It is no surprise that the Ford government still hasn’t released the updated data on municipal housing starts, especially when his government is on track to miss its housing targets for the fifth consecutive year,” Ontario Liberal MPP Adil Shamji said.
“The delay allows him to evade accountability until a time in the future when, he hopes, his housing record will be less embarrassing. However, he is already responsible for the fact that Ontario has consistently delivered the lowest housing starts in the entire country.”
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