Canadian housing survey: Ottawa-level results

Over the next 10 years, the City of Ottawa along with community partners will work across sectors to improve the safety, health and well-being of Ottawa residents. The Community Safety and Well-Being (CSWB) Plan will guide these efforts.

Reporting information about how Ottawa residents feel about their safety and well-being is an integral part of the CSWB Plan to support evidence-based decision making and help in the planning and delivery of services. In addition to routine reporting on safety and well-being indicators, thematic reports are produced under the CSWB Plan to cover specific topics in more depth.

Approach

This dashboard presents results from the Canadian Housing Survey (CHS). The CHS is conducted by Statistics Canada every two to three years to collect information about housing needs, economic hardship, neighborhood satisfaction, trust and perceived safety. The CHS is a cross-sectional survey with new households randomly selected to participate at the time of a new survey cycle. To date, data from two survey cycles are available (2018 and 2021). The most recent data collection period ran from October 2022 to March 2023.

Custom tabulations of aggregated survey results at the Ottawa level for 2018 and 2021 were produced by Statistics Canada for the CSWB Plan. The findings in this report are expressed as proportions based on the weighted sum of persons that was calculated by Statistics Canada for each indicator. Substantive differences in results within and between populations are reported across years. The statistical significance of the differences could not be tested because the raw data with sample weights was unavailable to the CSWB team for analysis. Under the advisement of Statistics Canada, some results are accompanied by the dagger symbol (ǂ) to indicate caution when interpreting this number due to reduced data quality resulting from small numbers. Any results that did not meet data quality standards have been suppressed and are not reported.

The dashboard contains graphical presentations of the CHS data.

• To reference the Ottawa-level results from the CHS, please use the following citation: Statistics Canada. 2022. Special tabulation, based on 2018 and 2021 cycles of the Canadian Housing Survey. Custom data tables produced for the City of Ottawa.

Financial pressures

• Overall, Ottawa households in 2021 reported greater ease meeting financial needs in the past year for daily expenses (housing, food, clothing, transportation, etc.) compared to 2018. This may in part be associated with temporary income transfer programs introduced in response to Covid-19.
• Ottawa residents who identified as racialized reported greater difficulty in their household’s ability to meet its financial needs compared to non-racialized respondents. Compared to 2018, differences in a household’s level of ease in meeting daily expenses widened between racialized and non-racialized respondents in 2021.
• Overall, the percentage of households in Ottawa who skipped or delayed their mortgage or rent payments in the past 12 months was similar in 2018 and 2021. Populations most impacted by job losses and reduced hours of employment at the start of the pandemic reported higher levels of skipped or delayed housing payments.
• Among those who skipped or delayed their mortgage or rent payment in the last 12 months, a higher percentage of Ottawa residents were currently behind in their housing payments at the time of answering the CHS in 2021 compared to 2018.

Perceptions of crime, social disorder, and personal safety

• Compared to 2018, a higher percentage of Ottawa residents in 2021 reported feeling safe from crime walking in their area after dark. People who identified as racialized and LGBTQ2S+ residents reported improvements in their perceptions of personal safety. Women continue to feel notably less safe than men.
• Ottawa residents with lower levels of educational attainment reported feeling more unsafe from crime in 2021 compared to 2018. As level of completed education is associated with income and the neighbourhoods people live in, this may indicate changing conditions in low-income neighbourhoods.
• For residents who identify as racialized or LGBTQ2S+, feeling safer would increase their likelihood of walking alone in their area after dark. This may indicate differences in how considerations for personal safety place constraints on daily life.
• Between 2018 and 2021, the percentage of residents who said that racial or religiously motivated harassment or attacks were not problems in their neighborhood increased among women and people who identified as racialized. Among people without a high school diploma, a higher percentage in 2021 reported problems in their neighborhood across indicators of social disorder.

Housing quality and needs

• Financial barriers were the main reason households had not made adaptations to their dwelling to accommodate a disability.

Satisfaction

• The percentage of Ottawa residents who felt very satisfied with their level of community belonging increased between 2018 and 2021 across populations except for people without a high school diploma.
• Overall, levels of life satisfaction remained relatively unchanged in Ottawa between 2018 and 2021. The difference in the percentage of racialized and non-racialized residents reporting high satisfaction narrowed but was still lower among those who identified as racialized. People without a high school diploma reported the greatest decline in life satisfaction.
• The percentage of people in Ottawa who felt their satisfaction with life decreased compared to five years ago was higher in 2021 compared to 2018. Across all population groups, a higher percentage of people reported decreased life satisfaction.

Trust

• Levels of trust in others varied by population. Lower levels of trust in other neighborhood residents and police officers were reported by people who identified as racialized or LGBTQ2S+, and people without a high school diploma.

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To download the data, visit Open Ottawa.

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