Jul 25th, 2024

OCH Working to Invest in Tenants 

Did you know that in 2023, OCH welcomed 1,216 new households from the city’s centralized waiting list for affordable housing?  

Providing homes and resources to new and existing tenants requires hard work and investment, so we wanted to share some numbers of where we worked to serve you better in 2023 and give you a snapshot of what we are working on this year.   

Capital Works 

Capital work means renovations that preserve housing for current and future tenants. Projects may also help improve energy efficiency – reducing the costs of heating and cooling your home.   

In 2023, we invested $39 million in capital work. Some highlights include: 

• $2.9 million on roofing,  

• $4.5 million on fire safety,  

• $8.9 million cladding (outer walls of buildings),  

• $3.4 million elevator modernization,  

• $5.1 million Project Guardian (13 properties), 

• $1.9 million Welcome Home (13 properties) 

You can find more information on repairs and renovations happening in OCH communities, visit www.och-lco.ca/i-am-a-tenant/improvements-repairs-renovations/  

Supports for tenants  

We know that the rising cost of living and changing communities present challenges. That’s why our team is working with 100 different partners to support vulnerable residents. In 2023, Community and Tenant Support team members visited 3,774 homes where tenants were at risk of losing their housing to help get things back on track and provide support and resources.  

The Community Development team works to help tenants envision and create the community they want to live in. In 2023, they supported 78 tenant groups focusing on food security and wellness. Want to get involved in your community? Check out our website www.och-lco.ca/i-am-a-tenant/get-involved/    

Going Green 

OCH has a whole team whose job is to help make greener and cleaner communities. In 2023, we worked on garbage room upgrades in 30 communities. Why the change? Garbage room retrofits allow us to create spaces for recycling and composting, helping to keep communities clean and reduce the amount of waste that goes into landfills.   

What’s next?  

In 2024, we budgeted $0.3 million for building electrical outage prevention and $0.4 million for more energy-efficient in-suite lighting retrofits. 

Serving you better 

Our tenant services team, which includes maintenance, pest management, and tenant support, completed 28,600 tenant surveys. These surveys allowed us to hear how you feel about work done in your home. The results are 86 percent satisfaction! The surveys are part of a larger strategy to gather feedback so we can improve in real-time.     

OCH partners 

We are so grateful for the people at the OCH Foundation, who help provide support and resources that improve the lives of residents. Here’s a snapshot of the work they did last year.   

• 143 students graduated from the Youth Futures   

• 25 students received $1,000 as part of the Inspired by Learning Bursary  

• 1,463 backpacks delivered to students through the Pack-a-Sack program  

• 387 bicycles gifted to families through the Hop on Bikes program  

• More than 1,000 families were connected with sports and recreation activities through recLINK 

We will continue to work for you!  

This information comes from OCH’s Annual Report, which was presented to Ottawa City Council in June.  

In addition to sharing what we worked on last year, we plan to finish this year with:   

• $45.2 million for capital works projects – community improvements  

• $0.3 million for the building’s electrical outage prevention & $0.4 million for in-suite lighting retrofit Vehicle  

• 1.8 million for Welcome Home projects which aim to create more welcoming homes by beautifying common areas. 

• Elevator modernization is in progress at 1365 Bank, 251 Doanld, Regina Towers and 1680 Walkley  

• Hybrid heating with heat pumps in select townhome communities will reduce greenhouse gas emissions and save utilities.   

Are you interested in learning more? Check out our 2024 budget.