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By Ashley Lavallee-Koenig

MORE MONEY INTO PROGRAM

Red Deer city council adjusts administrative fees for Indigenous stream of Reaching Home

Mar 24, 2025 | 4:44 PM

Red Deer city council has amended a Budget 2025 decision by reducing administrative fees to 10 per cent of funding, from 15 per cent, for the Indigenous stream of the Reaching Home program.

Sarah Tittemore, General Manager of Community Services, explained that decreasing the administrative fees as recommended will free up approximately $34,000 to go directly into the Reaching Home program and the community.

These fees are charged by the City to cover the cost of administering the program. Tittemore added, Red Deer’s direct costs can generally be covered by an administration fee of 10 per cent or less.

The decision is the result of a letter sent by the Housing and Homelessness Integration Committee (HHIC) recommending the change be made.

One of the decisions made by council during last year’s budget debate, where it faced the challenge of an $18 million deficit, was to increase the administration fees for both streams of the Reaching Home program. For the Indigenous stream, this tripled the rate from 5 per cent to 15.

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In the Jan. 28, 2025, HHIC meeting, the committee flagged this increase as an issue and subsequently sent a letter to council describing it as “inappropriate and unacceptable” given the City’s commitment to reconciliation.

The committee also referenced the most recent Point in Time (PiT) count, in which Indigenous people accounted for about 32 per cent of respondents, despite only making up 5.3 per cent of Red Deer’s population, as a signal that more focused support is needed.

“We get the opportunity once in a while to get things really right; we didn’t get it right a few months back,” reflected Mayor Ken Johnston. “This is one where the opportunity to assist and to leverage the dollars and put it into a community that is so overrepresented here, that reconciliation is the driver of this and should continue to be the driver of this as we go froward.”

Related: People experiencing homelessness in Red Deer now at least 766, more than double 2022 figures

Reaching Home is a national community-based program aimed at preventing and reducing homelessness that launched in 2019. In Red Deer, the city works with community and government partners to build and implement a responsive, sustainable and well-performing housing and homelessness response system.

Other financial business handled in the March 24 meeting included a change to the funding source for the Sorenson Station Washroom Capital Project.

On Feb. 24, council approved $450,000 for the project, to be funded by debt/borrowing. Today, council amended that total to come from Municipal Sustainability Initiative (MSI) grant funding instead, if possible.

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