Yellowknife (Mar 28/03) - Toronto-based Frontiers Foundation shared its affordable housing concepts with Yellowknife last week, hoping they hoping might prove useful locally.

Rev. Charles Catto shows a Yellowknife audience some of the projects his charitable organization, Frontiers Foundation, has built. - Erin Fletcher/NNSL photo

Rev. Charles Catto, founder of Frontiers Foundation: Operation Beaver, spoke to about 20 Yellowknife residents at the Great Hall in the legislative assembly.

The Frontiers Foundation is a non-profit Canadian organization that aims to improve communities through volunteer support and affordable housing initiatives.

Since its inception in 1964 the foundation and volunteers have built more than 3,000 homes for aboriginal people across Canada.

He said through volunteers and donated resources a home that would cost the government $100,000 to build or renovate could cost as little as $19,000.

In Smiths Falls, Ontario, Frontiers Foundation built a $43,000 three-bedroom home for a family who'd been living in an old bus for seven years.

"This is something that could be happening all across Canada," said Catto.

In December 2002 the foundation completed the first 74-unit affordable housing complex in Toronto. Called Amik, the homes were built on the site of an old garment factory.

"We're here to share the information with anybody who's interested," said Catto of why he came to NWT.

"What we have here is a cloneable prototype."

The multi-million dollar facility took nine years to complete and was mostly funded by the City of Toronto, the federal government and the private sector. The foundation provided the volunteer workforce.

Catto hopes to continue creating similar projects across Canada.

"If we could only get the billions and trillions spent on destruction turned around and fight the real enemy of the human race -- homelessness and poverty," said Catto.

But there are many "towering" obstacles to overcome, he said.

Catto, an Order of Canada and Aboriginal Order of Canada recipient, was recently selected to co-lead a national committee for the establishment of a national self-help housing initiative.

He said some federal, provincial and territorial legislation makes financing a project like Amik difficult and the national committee hopes to change that.

He said under the current legislation a charitable organization has to come up with a 5.5 per cent deposit before starting a project.

"It's an albatross around your neck," he said of the $350,000 needed for the Amik project.

Frontiers Foundation hasn't had a building project in the NWT for years but continues to deploy international volunteers to remote regions to assist with education programs and community projects.