OrilliaMatters welcomes letters to the editor at [email protected]. Please include your daytime phone number and address (for verification of authorship, not publication). The following letter is in response to a story published to OrilliaMatters on Jan. 30: Affordable housing for seniors may be coming to downtown Orillia.
I applaud Bryce Taylor and the Sionito Group for this initiative. There truly seems to be a need for affordable housing in Orillia and area. Seniors on fixed incomes are at great risk in these times of increasing rents, rising foods costs and inflation in general.
After reading recent articles and letters on Tyler Dunlop’s situation I am hoping there are also plans to bring more of this type of affordable housing to the non-seniors of Orillia. I appreciate that affordable and stable housing is not the only need of homeless people in our community like Tyler – but it is a starting point and a necessity. To have an intelligent, able bodied, willing to work person like Tyler give up on life is a shame and a very poor reflection on our society.
So I would encourage Orillia City Council to listen, to be compassionate to support projects of this nature and to actively seek out developers like the Sionito Group who champion and develop affordable housing projects of this nature.
Doug Varty
Oro-Medonte
