{"id":14484,"date":"2016-06-15T10:47:25","date_gmt":"2016-06-15T14:47:25","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/?p=14484"},"modified":"2016-06-23T12:32:13","modified_gmt":"2016-06-23T16:32:13","slug":"mpp-chris-ballard-named-minister-of-housing","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/mpp-chris-ballard-named-minister-of-housing\/","title":{"rendered":"MPP Chris Ballard named Minister of Housing"},"content":{"rendered":"

By Brock Weir<\/strong><\/p>\n

When Premier Kathleen Wynne called Newmarket-Aurora MPP Chris Ballard on Saturday with an offer to become Ontario\u2019s new Minister of Housing and Minister Responsible for Poverty Reduction, he didn\u2019t have to be asked twice. <\/p>\n

The hard part was keeping it a secret, but come Monday he and his family were at Queen\u2019s Park for his swearing in by the Lieutenant-Governor, sharing in the excitement of Premier Wynne\u2019s cabinet shuffle.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis is such an honour for me that the Premier would have confidence that I can move two important portfolios forward,\u201d said Mr. Ballard, a former Aurora Councillor. \u201cThe Premier, in consultation with others out there, as well as myself, knew my passion for [affordable housing and homelessness] so I didn\u2019t give it a second thought. When she called and asked if I would be interested in this new portfolio, I agreed. I think our creating a standalone Ministry of Housing really sends a message to the Federal Government about how serious we are in negotiating appropriately for the good of Ontario \u2013 so there was no arm-twisting required!\u201d<\/p>\n

Since being elected to Queen\u2019s Park two years ago, homelessness, poverty-reduction and affordable housing are among the chief areas Mr. Ballard has been advocating for. Now that he\u2019s steering those portfolios, he says he is eager to roll out legislation he has been working on as a Member of Parliament. <\/p>\n

\u201cI know these issues are near and dear to the hearts of many, not only facing people in my riding, but across Ontario,\u201d he said. \u201cWe have got legislation that has been introduced that will focus on increasing the stock of affordable housing across Ontario, I will need to make sure we move on that, that it is implemented, and that we are working closely with our municipal partners. What\u2019s really exciting about this too is we have entered a new era of Federal government relationships, so I will be leading the charge to negotiate Federal dollars for Ontario and social housing.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhat I have heard from an awful lot of activists in the community and Town Councillors is the importance of the Province working closely with municipalities and with organizations on the street to deliver the right service at the right time. Working closely and not imposing a Made at Queen\u2019s Park solution right across the Province, but really working closely with individual organizations and municipalities to find out what is important to them and what their priorities are.\u201d<\/p>\n

There is a strong focus on organizations like food banks, shelters and homelessness services such as Inn From the Cold, and working with youth and, as a result, he says \u201cinteresting affordable housing things\u201d are happening particularly in Newmarket with rental accommodations.<\/p>\n

He wants to trumpet what Newmarket is doing within the ministry but also impart a sense he is getting from everyone in the community \u201con the need to get it right when it comes to housing, affordable housing and social housing.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201c[We] need to make sure that as the Province\u2019s economy continues to grow and we continue to add new jobs that we don\u2019t leave anybody behind.\u201d<\/p>\n\"Facebook\"<\/a>\"twitter\"<\/a>\"mail\"<\/a>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Newmarket-Aurora MPP Chris Ballard was named Ontario’s Minister of Housing and Minister Responsible for Poverty Reduction in Premier Kathleen Wynne’s cabinet shuffle on Monday morning. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":14475,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[4,5],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-14484","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-general_news","category-news"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p3D2k4-3LC","publishpress_future_action":{"enabled":false,"date":"2026-08-25 15:22:00","action":"change-status","newStatus":"draft","terms":[],"taxonomy":"category","extraData":[]},"publishpress_future_workflow_manual_trigger":{"enabledWorkflows":[]},"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/06\/2016-06-16-06.jpg","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14484","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=14484"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14484\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/14475"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=14484"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=14484"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=14484"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}