Donate Now
Inclusive Housing Solutions Lab

At Home in a Neighbourhood Where I Belong

This Housing Lab was convened by L’Arche Canada and funded by Canada Mortgage and Housing Corporation. Work took place in New Brunswick, with a national Community of Practice, from January 2021 to September 2022.

We started by asking

How can we work together to ensure that everyone – including persons with intellectual disabilities, has an affordable and accessible home that supports a sense of belonging and connection to the community?

Our Focus

Persons with intellectual disabilities in Canada are disproportionately experiencing homelessness, living in poverty, or in substandard housing. Inclusion Canada estimates that of the approximately 750,000 persons with intellectual disabilities in Canada, between 100,000 – 120,000 are experiencing housing and support gaps.

From a Housing First perspective, this lack of housing security underpins other gaps in peoples’ lives including access to support, services and social connection.

Knowing this, the work of the Lab focused on inclusive housing solutions that support and nurture belonging for everyone – including people with intellectual disabilities.

Guiding Principles

Inclusive Housing Benefits Everyone
vibrant orange icon of three people
Centering People with Living Experience
icon image of puzzle pieces fitting together
Cross-Sectoral Collaboration

 

 

The Lab had 5 phases:

  1. Definition
  2. Discovery
  3. Development
  4. Test and Prototype
  5. Roadmap

Learning together

Engaging people with disabilities as co-leaders and co-learners was essential to the work of this Lab.

Persons with intellectual disabilities were co-leaders and co-learners throughout the Lab as members of:

  • New Brunswick Stewardship Partners Team
  • Lived Experience Advisory Committee
  • Peer Researchers
  • Focus Groups

Guided by the New Brunswick Stewardship Partners Team. Profiles

Resource sharing by the National Community of Practice Team. CoP Profiles

“It’s a very important project. I like sharing experiences and learning from other people as well.”

Stacey Howe
Stewardship Team member from Saint John, NB
Learning Together
Inclusive Housing Solutions Lab Partners
View Partners
Inclusive Housing Lab Partners Meeting

Lab Learnings

As part of the Lab process, we looked into the barriers and opportunities to creating inclusive housing. We conducted research through interviews, focus groups, peer research, and secondary research.

There are barriers to creating inclusive housing

The barriers we uncovered fell into four categories depicted by the four levels of the iceberg:

  • The tip – shows us what is happening, the EVENTS we are seeing
  • Second level – lays out the PATTERNS or trends
  • Third level – what influences the patterns, the SYSTEMS or contributing structures
  • Fourth level – the thinking or MINDSETS that influence our systems and patterns
Click image to enlarge Iceberg Image

There are also many opportunities

The Lab also found a number of “levers” we can pull to make positive change and move forward on inclusive housing initiatives. Click image to enlarge

key-leverage-points

Different people have different housing wants and needs

Click image to enlarge Meet Edna Meet Cindy Meet Carol and Matthew
Are you involved in an inclusive housing initiative? Want to connect with one of the groups working on the action plan?
Are you involved in an inclusive housing initiative? Want to connect with one of the groups working on the action plan?

Our Housing Coordinator is here to help!

Get in touch!