YMCA of Cumberland housing strategy
Happy Cities helped the YMCA of Cumberland to develop its housing strategy for Cumberland County, NS.
The housing vision for the YMCA of Cumberland. (Happy Cities)
Nova Scotia’s North Shore faces a housing shortage—with the region anticipating that 2,000 new units are needed by 2027 to accommodate the growing population.
In Cumberland County, one of the regions in the North Shore, the local YMCA—which has served Amherst for over 140 years, wanted to address this shortage by developing its own housing strategy. They partnered with the Affordable Housing Association of Nova Scotia in 2021 to renovate 153 Church Street in Amherst into four affordable housing units, and in this process sought to develop an overarching housing strategy to guide the organization.
Happy Cities collaborated with the YMCA of Cumberland to create a Housing Vision and Development Strategy, and helped YMCA secure a capacity-building grant from the Nova Scotia Community Housing Growth Fund. The key goals of the project were to:
Establish a housing mission and vision based on core values
Conduct two workshops with staff and board members to foster knowledge and consensus on housing growth
Build internal capacity for redevelopment or acquisition of future units
Create a decision-making framework for future development and acquisition
Conduct a real estate portfolio assessment
Develop key recommendations, including target units and required operational and staff capacity for future growth
Happy Cities collaborated with the YMCA of Cumberland's to define its mission, vision, and values for its housing strategy. (Happy Cities)
By providing them with the tools to initiate affordable housing development in Cumberland County, Happy Cities helped YMCA gain a clear direction on their acquisition and new development strategy for the next five years. This initiative marked a step toward addressing this emerging need for housing in Cumberland County.
