Content Note: This article mentions substance use, mental health challenges, and intimate partner violence. If you need support with a mental health crisis, you can access resources at this link. If you or someone you know needs help related to family violence, you can find resources here.

It feels like she’s going back in time, Ashley said. 

Before her struggles with substance use and mental health. Before the overdoses and the abusive relationships. Before the stints in and out of jail. In and out of homelessness. 

Back to a time of independence and stability. 

“A lot of my stress is gone. I know I have a place. I know it’s mine now. I’ve already showered there. I slept there. My room’s done,” she said. 

In February 2026, Ashley moved into an apartment of her own in St. Thomas, Ontario, for the first time in a decade. She had previously spent several years experiencing homelessness and precarious housing, before living for the last four years in two separate permanent supportive housing programs operated by Indwell, a charity focused on building affordable and supportive housing in southern Ontario. 

“Indwell was a good stepping stone, but I’m ready to leave it. There’s a lot more support there, but I’m doing better, and I just don’t need it,” Ashley said.

She credits St. Thomas-Elgin’s newest addition to their homelessness response system, a dedicated homelessness prevention team, with giving her the confidence and help she needed to take the leap. 

“When it came to the point of me having a place, trying to put it all together, that’s where I struggled and I wouldn’t do it. I had housing arranged four times, that I gave up … I had it all, but it was trying to figure out the funding part,” said Ashley.

Railway City Lofts is a permanent supportive housing program operated by Indwell in St. Thomas, Ont., with 15 units for people exiting homelessness.

The prevention team, made up of two full-time housing caseworkers with access to a flex fund to support housing stabilization, was created in October 2025 thanks to a partnership with the Canadian Alliance to End Homelessness (CAEH), and funding from the federal Homelessness Reduction Innovation Fund (HRIF). 

HRIF supports data-driven improvement projects that aim to measurably reduce homelessness at a population level, while developing lessons that can support similar efforts across Canada. 

The project aimed to reduce chronic homelessness in St. Thomas-Elgin by 29 per cent by reducing the total number of people returning to homelessness after successfully being housed. 

And the community has been finding success. 

Prior to October 2025, an average of 3.6 people lost their housing and returned to chronic homelessness each month. Since the HRIF project began, the community has seen an average of roughly one person per month return to homelessness. 

That has helped the community reduce chronic homelessness by 36.7 per cent since June 2025. 

“Returns from housing are one metric that homelessness response systems measure and address when trying to make homelessness reductions,” said Chantal Perry, CAEH’s lead improvement advisor for St. Thomas-Elgin. 

“By reducing the number of people falling back into homelessness through this HRIF project, we’re seeing deep reductions in chronic homelessness in St. Thomas-Elgin,” Perry said. 

This is the latest accomplishment in a series of many milestones for St. Thomas-Elgin, which has long been committed, from senior community leaders to frontline workers, to making homelessness rare, brief, and non-recurring, Perry said. 

HRIF project contributing to reduction in homelessness 

Historically, St. Thomas-Elgin has been really effective at helping people move from homelessness into housing, said John D’Oria, the supervisor of housing stability services with St. Thomas-Elgin Social Services. 

But when the community looked at their data with the help of their CAEH improvement advisor, they noticed a gap, with a relatively high number of people losing their housing. 

That’s how the HRIF project was born, originally to prevent people from returning to homelessness. 

But as the one-year project was implemented, D’Oria said they identified additional situations where the support of housing caseworkers was essential to ensure housing stability. 

“With some folks, the tenancy was unsalvageable, because of certain extenuating circumstances, like they go to hospital and they’re not going to return … so we have to pivot. An exit to homelessness is going to happen, but how do we work over the next 30 days to make sure they land back on their feet,” said D’Oria. 

“About a quarter of the people we’ve been working with, we’ve had to rehouse in some capacity. As their story unfolds, you’re unfolding your support with them and finding solutions as you go,” he said. 

The two housing caseworkers are supporting a total of 40 households. To date, all of them are maintaining stable housing, D’Oria said. 

The Station is a permanent supportive housing program operated by Indwell in St. Thomas, Ont., with 45 one-bedroom units.

Among those 40 households are people like Ashley, who have been supported to move from an environment with intensive supports to independent housing. 

“Ashley’s story shows what’s possible over the spectrum of housing. Her journey started unsheltered, and then moved to Railway City Lofts, and then to The Station, [two highly intensive supportive housing programs]. This program helped her get over the hump, get her into the private market … and focus on what is on the other side of her experience with homelessness,” he said.

“When you put her journey together over the course of a five-year window, you can see this is a totally different life that she’s able to live now because of the solutions and support that are available,” said D’Oria. 

In this case, it also meant that a unit became available in the supportive housing program, which was offered to help another person exit homelessness and receive the higher level of support that they need, D’Oria said.  

This flow within the system, enabled by the HRIF project, in turn opens resources for more people who can move out of homelessness and into permanent housing in St. Thomas-Elgin. 

Connecting with new landlords, and resolving conflicts 

Ashley said she was ready to leave the supportive housing environment, no longer needing the intensive supports offered — like guest management policies, room checks, and meal service. 

But without the support of the HRIF project team, she doesn’t think she’d have taken the step to look for and secure her own place. 

“I’d probably be signing for another four years [at The Station],” she said. 

Eleisha Oldfield, one of the two housing caseworkers, did the research to find an affordable rental and booked an appointment for Ashley.

“They assisted me with going to the apartment, making it more comfortable … they did a lot of the talking at the interview. I didn’t because I was nervous,” Ashley said. 

“[Even now that I’ve moved], if I have any stress, not understanding stuff, I can go to the prevention team, knowing I still have a support system,” she added. 

A big part of the housing caseworker job is to build relationships with landlords and help mediate conflicts as they arise to mend relations and prevent evictions, said Oldfield. 

“If we can make those connections, it really helps … it is extremely difficult finding affordable units … I know another landlord, she’s offered that once some of her current tenants leave, she wants me to fill those units,” Oldfield said. 

Flex fund helps with housing stability 

When a person starts working with the prevention team, they typically require a more intensive level of support, said Stephanie Bezaire, a housing caseworker with the HRIF project. 

“They might be facing eviction or leaving a program or they’ve found their own place. That is all really scary for folks. We’re pretty hands-on in the beginning, and then over the last six months, I’ve noticed a natural decrease in the amount of support needed,” Bezaire said. 

Having access to a pot of flexible funding is important to pay for things that help with housing stability, whether that’s one-time funding to help pay a bit of missing rent, or specialized hoarding support services — both things that can prevent evictions. 

But there are other daily items that help with people’s stability. 

In one person’s case, his mental health started to decline when his unit became more disorganized. But the purchase of a dresser meant he could organize his clothes and keep his unit tidier. 

In another case, a man’s mental health would decline in the evenings, leading him to pace in the unit all night, disturbing other tenants and leading to some tension. The team was able to purchase a television, so instead of pacing, he was able to put his mind at ease. 

“By no means is this program a substitute for folks that need medically intensive support … but it dovetails really well. The dresser was a $120 solution that the healthcare system doesn’t have,” D’Oria said. 

“It’s those simple solutions that prevent homelessness before it starts,” he added. 

A roadmap to preventing homelessness 

More broadly, D’Oria says this HRIF project has helped the community shift their focus from crisis response to prevention and envision the supports that will be needed once they’ve solved chronic homelessness. 

“As we see less and less individuals on our By-Name Data … this project has allowed us to learn where we see the puck going … in the direction of housing stability, getting more upstream, more preventative,” he said. 

In a community that’s already close-knit, already rallying around the shared goal of ending homelessness, HRIF has given St. Thomas-Elgin a tool to partner with health, with justice, with housing providers and with landlords, strengthening the entire homelessness response, D’Oria said. 

“Chronic homelessness is solvable, and it’s solvable one person at a time, one housing placement at a time.” 

*This Bright Spot is funded by the Government of Canada.