Regional Housing Support Services offers housing related services to members of the community of Simcoe County.
Support is offered to community members at risk of homelessness, experiencing homelessness or experiencing rental and/or utilities arrears.
For more information please use the icons below.
Find local drop-in hours, make a housing appointment or receive assistance applying to funding programs.
We provide case management support to community members experiencing chronic homelessness.
Find helpful resources or make an appointment to receive assistance as a local tenant.
Being a landlord comes with a lot of responsibility, and sometimes you may not know where to turn for help.
Supports and services offered by Housing Resource Centres are by appointment only. All regions offer drop-in times at specified locations. Please select your region of choice for more information on drop-in time and location in your community. To book an appointment, please call: (705) 739-0485 or email: housingcalls@empowersimcoe.ca
Ontario Works
136 Bayfield St. 4 th Floor, Barrie, ON
(Parking off Maple Street)
Monday 1:00 pm – 4:00 pm
Wednesday 9:00 am – 12:00 pm
Barrie Public Library – Downtown Branch
60 Worsley St., Barrie, Ontario
Monday 9:30 am – 12:00 pm
Thursday 1:00 pm – 4:00 pm
Hope Centre
34 Mary St., Barrie, Ontario
Fri 2:00 pm – 4:00 pm
Ontario Works
250 West Street North, Orillia, Ontario
Tuesdays 1:00 pm – 4:00 pm
Orillia Public Library
36 Mississaga St., West, Orillia, Ontario
Thursdays 1:00 pm – 4:00 pm
Midland Public Library
320 King Street, Midland, Ontario
Tues 9:30 am – 12:30 pm
Collingwood Public Library
55 Ste. Marie St., Collingwood, Ontario
Tues 12:30 pm – 3:00 pm
Wasaga Beach Public Library
544 River Road West, Wasaga Beach, Ontario
Thurs 1:00 pm – 3:00 pm
Housing Resource Centres are located throughout Simcoe County and can provide the following assistance:
We also offer information and assistance with applying to the programs below:
HRF assists with: arrears of rent or mortgage payments, arrears in utilities, last month's rent, or moving expenses.
LEAP was created to help individuals or families who are struggling to pay their electricity bills throughout the year.
OESP lowers electricity bills for households experiencing lower income by providing a monthly credit to eligible customers.
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Empower Simcoe is dedicated to fostering inclusive communities where everyone can live, learn, and thrive.
Serving Barrie, Orillia, Bradford, and surrounding areas, we empower individuals and families through innovative programs and passionate care, ensuring that every person we serve reaches their fullest potential.
Information
Belonging refers to a sense of connectedness to others, an individual’s experiences of being valued, of forming relationships with others and making contributions as part of a group, a community, the natural world.
Goal for children: Every child has a sense of belonging when he or she is connected to others and contributes to their world.
Children demonstrate a sense of belonging when they:
• feel included and safe in relationships with adults and other children in the early years setting;
• participate fully in ways that are most comfortable to them;
• participate in social interactions, shared exploration, play, and learning with adults and children;
• make smooth transitions between home and early years settings;
• begin to show concern and empathy and take action to assist others;
• notice similarities and differences between self and others and respond positively to the uniqueness, differing capabilities, and perspectives of others;
• recognize, explore, and make connections:
– between home and the early childhood setting,
– with their community,
– with the natural environment;
• express a sense of purpose as they participate and make contribution
Program expectation: Early childhood programs cultivate authentic, caring relationships and connections to create a sense of belonging among and between children, adults, and the world around them.
Educators can create contexts in which all children can develop a sense of belonging by:
• being attuned to the physical and emotional states of each child and responding in a warm and sensitive manner;
• connecting with each child and recognizing and valuing his or her unique spirit, individuality, and presence;
• planning for ways to support smooth transitions:
– between the home and the early years setting,
– in daily routines,
– across early years settings;
• supporting relationships between children as they initiate, respond, collaborate, celebrate, and demonstrate care for others;
• developing policies, practices, and environments that respect and support inclusion, meaningful participation, and a sense of belonging for all children;
• finding ways to intentionally integrate the unique perspectives and gifts of parents, caregivers, and extended family throughout all elements of the program in a meaningful and authentic way;
• establishing and maintaining positive reciprocal relationships with community partners to support meaningful participation;
• creating opportunities throughout daily experiences that enable children to explore, wonder about, care for, and make connections to the natural environment;
• giving visibility to the many relationships that children form with adults, other children, the community, and the natural world through various forms of documentation;
• inviting community members to contribute to and participate in the program and providing opportunities for children to participate and make meaningful contributions to the
Additional considerations for educators
A warm and caring manner is conveyed through body language as well as words – how we touch, carry, and move children through daily routines sends a strong message.
Capitalize on opportunities for one-to-one interactions during daily routines (e.g., for infants and toddlers: diaper changing, dressing to go outdoors, and feeding/meal times are ideal opportunities for making connections and building relationships).
Discover the unique characteristics and gifts of each child by talking with his or her family, observing, and documenting (e.g., in addition to what the children are interested in, notice what brings them joy and how they relate to others and to the environment around them; to support inclusion, consider each child’s capabilities rather than focusing solely
Rather than reprimanding children for undesirable behaviours, assist them in finding new ways to achieve their goals (e.g., look for the root cause of behaviour; reduce stressors; support children’s efforts to initiate and join in play with others; notice, acknowledge, and document positive interactions and attempts at self-regulation and share the information with children and families to gain new insights).
Helping all children in the program to gain a clearer understanding of the capabilities and challenges of others is a way to build their social competence. The ability to value the differences of others is strengthened both for typically developing children and for children who require additional support.
Build connections between the home and the program by communicating with families using multiple means (e.g., send e-mail updates; create a blog; set up a documentation panel and place it near the entrance where families can find out more about their children’s experiences; invite families to comment on a specific piece of documentation; suggest ways families can extend learning at home to build on a particular idea children are exploring; encourage families to help you.
Engagement refers to a state of being genuinely involved and interested in what one is doing. Optimal conditions for learning occur when we are fully engaged.
For children, this happens in play that evolves from the child’s natural curiosity – active play that allows children to explore with their bodies, minds, and senses, stimulating them to ask questions, test theories, solve problems, engage in creative thinking, and make meaning of the world around them. These investigations through play fuse intellect and feeling to help children make connections and develop the capacity for higher-order thinking.
Research into learning and development – from the early theories of Dewey, Piaget, and Vygotsky to the latest findings of neuroscience – makes it clear that children learn best when they are fully engaged in active exploration, play, and inquiry (Gopnik, 2009). When children initiate experiences, generate ideas, plan, problem-solve, make meaningful choices, and act spontaneously through play, they are more likely to be happy and get along well with others, to have lower levels of stress, and to be attentive and motivated to learn.64 When children are fully engaged, they develop dispositions and skills for lifelong learning that are important for success in school and beyond.
Ways in which children might demonstrate engagement
Goal for children: Every child is an active and engaged learner who explores the world with body, mind, and senses.
Children are engaged learners when they:
• express joy and wonder in their encounters with the environment, the natural world, and other people;
• focus attention, manipulate, investigate, observe, question, test theories, solve problems, create, and represent ideas and their understanding of the world around them through play in divergent and increasingly complex ways;
• engage with others to negotiate, collaborate, create, and communicate feelings, ideas, experiences, and knowledge;
• through their play, explore materials that support an increasing awareness and understanding of concepts associated with literacy and numeracy;
• participate to the best of their abilities in an inclusive learning environment.
Ways in which programs can foster engagement
Program expectation: Early childhood programs provide environments and experiences to engage children in active, creative, and meaningful exploration, play, and inquiry.
Educators can create contexts that engage children by:
• designing indoor and outdoor environments and experiences that spark curiosity, invite investigation, and provide challenges that are responsive to individual capabilities to help children extend the boundaries of their learning;
• connecting with families and communities and inviting their participation to ensure that environments and experiences reflect and are relevant to children’s everyday lives;
• providing a wide variety of interesting objects and open-ended materials for children to explore with their senses, manipulate, and investigate;
• planning daily routines (the flow of the day) with limited interruptions and transitions to maintain a sense of calm and simplicity for infants and toddlers, and providing ample opportunities through large blocks of time for older children to engage in sustained, complex play and inquiry; participating with children as a coinvestigator, co-learner, and co-planner rather than as director or “keeper of knowledge” and “keeper of the plans” in a way that is separate and apart from the children;
• continuously questioning and testing their own theories and strategies and seeking new ideas to facilitate children’s exploration and understanding of the world around them in meaningful ways;
• working with families and community partners to ensure that environments and experiences provide equal learning experiences for all children by making
flexible program adaptations and providing special equipment and/or adaptive devices (as recommended by a regulated health professional);
• ensuring that the spaces and experiences provided promote play and inquiry that will help children discover and develop an increasing awareness and understanding of key concepts, including those associated with literacy and numeracy development;
• documenting and making children’s thinking, learning, and competence visible to children, families, and others.
Additional considerations for educators
Assess the type of toys and materials available in your program and consider replacing those that limit exploration (e.g., single-purpose toys) with “open-ended” materials that can be used in many ways (e.g., for infants: objects that encourage exploration of questions such as, “How does this feel, sound, taste, move?”; for toddlers: materials to help them explore questions such as, “What parts does this have? What can I make it do?”; for preschoolers: materials that encourage construction and exploratory questions such as, “How does this go together?” “What can I make?”; for older children: opportunities to encourage representation of their thinking and ideas through various mediums).
Create environments and experiences that support active engagement and meaningful exploration by focusing on the questions and theories children investigate through their play. This may involve moving away from traditional, adult-chosen themes towards what children are engaged and interested in as a starting point for planning. Educators also need to make decisions about the types of interests that have potential for rich and complex play. This could mean focusing less on the objects that interest children and more on what children are doing with the objects: What questions are they asking through their play? What theories are they testing? What are they noticing and attending to? What problems are they solving?
For example, observing a group of children interested in cars, educators noticed that it wasn’t so much the cars children were focused on as more complex questions such as, “How can I make it move?”; “What happens on different surfaces?”; “How can I make it go faster?”; “How can I build a ramp?”; “What other things roll?”; “What might happen if I try these ideas outside?” Exploring questions and theories about “movement” through their play deepens children’s learning and engages them in thinking about physics and mathematical concepts.
