Amid a nationwide housing crisis, co-operatives should be central to expanding affordable supply across Canada because they are owned and governed for the benefit of members rather than investors and thus can preserve affordability over the long term.
Co-op members elect their boards and participate in major decisions that affect their homes, including rents and renovations. However, having this democratic structure does not always mean members can participate meaningfully in governing the co-operative. That needs to change.
Research has identified concerns (p. 75-78) about opaque decision-making and weak communication, uneven participation (p. 9-10) and board dynamics (p. 102-103) that can concentrate influence in relatively few hands, limiting how effectively the full membership can exercise democratic control.
As the federal government attempts to rapidly expand co-operative housing, strengthening its democratic governance can help ensure that public funding delivers durable affordability and a better experience for members.
There are multiple ways to do this, including ensuring neutral and effective ways for members to communicate; governance training; a plan to sustain member participation and leadership renewal; regulatory oversight that extends beyond annual financial audits; clear internal routes for raising governance concerns; and an independent option for complaints when internal approaches fail.
Ottawa already attaches conditions to the financing used to create co-operatives. The $1.5-billion co-op housing development program of the Canada Mortgage and Housing Corp. (CMHC) – the largest federal investment in new co-operative housing in more than 30 years – provides forgivable and low-interest loans, Its funding agreements already specify conditions and reporting requirements.
As of June 30, 2026, the program had committed $1.19 billion toward 2,788 new co-operative homes while CMHC is working with Build Canada Homes on further proposals. As this new generation of co-operative homes is financed and built, the federal government has an opportunity to use comparable policy safeguards to strengthen member control while preserving the autonomy of the co-operatives.
Making democratic rights usable
Members have legal rights to participate in their co-operative’s decisions, elect directors and run for the board. But those rights are harder to exercise when members cannot communicate easily with one another or with those seeking their vote.
Existing law provides little protection. In Ontario, obtaining a membership list requires (Section 120) a formal statutory process. A member must file an affidavit and may have to pay a fee if the co-op prepares the list. Even then, ordinary members and board candidates do not have the same practical access to the co-op’s established communication systems as board members and management.
A legal right to member contact information does not eliminate this communication asymmetry. A list of names and addresses is also challenging to communicate to the membership, particularly when privacy concerns limit the circulation of personal contact information.
For co-operatives entering new federal funding agreements, CMHC should require a fair, privacy-protecting way for members and board candidates to communicate with the full membership. For example, the co-op could distribute a member’s or candidate’s message through its existing email, newsletter or notice system without releasing private contact details.
This would make an existing democratic right usable in practice without telling members how to vote or co-ops how to govern.
Build the next generation of co-op leaders
Democratic governance depends on institutions that prepare members to lead and transfer knowledge when boards change. In housing co-operatives, directors are often volunteers and the work can be demanding.
Without regular training, succession planning and opportunities for interested members to gain leadership experience, governance can fall to a small subset of residents, concentrating knowledge about finances and management, while increasing overload and burnout (p.69).
The Agency for Co-operative Housing recommends ongoing board education, while the Co-operative Housing Federation of Canada provides training for directors and members. The challenge for the new generation of co-operatives is to make leadership renewal part of governance from the beginning by training current directors and meaningfully engaging members. Engagement should go beyond increasing participation numbers by building knowledge, confidence, ownership and belonging while developing a broader pool of future leaders.
CMHC could require directors to complete governance training as a condition of funding new co-operatives, while expecting co-ops to maintain a member engagement and leadership-renewal plan. Training should be open to any interested member and reasonable training costs should also be eligible for support, so more residents are prepared to serve on committees, run for the board and take on other governance roles.
Look beyond the financial audit
Many federally assisted co-operatives already submit audited financial statements, which the Agency for Co-operative Housing uses to assess financial health and compliance with CMHC agreements. But financial audits do not necessarily assess whether the board has effectively governed major management contracts, capital projects or reserves or whether democratic accountability is present.
There is already a precedent. Earlier CMHC operating agreements allowed it to respond to poor governance, while today’s Federal Community Housing Initiative, Phase 2 (FCHI-2) program requires participating housing providers to submit and update three-year action plans, which can include governance goals. These plans provide a useful starting point, but they are not a substitute for assessing whether governance is working in practice.
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CMHC could build on this model by adding a small set of governance indicators to mandatory reporting, such as whether directors completed orientation, whether member communication and participation processes are functioning and whether major financial and asset management decisions receive documented board oversight.
The results should also be available to members. Persistent problems could trigger additional support or independent review.
Give members somewhere to turn
Co-operatives should ideally resolve most disagreements themselves. But that becomes difficult when a member’s concern is about the board. Members may have rights to records, meetings and fair voting procedures, but enforcing those rights can sometimes require going outside the co-operative.
Because many of these rights are established through provincial law, the remedies available to members vary across Canada. British Columbia offers one model. Its Civil Resolution Tribunal can hear disputes involving records, meetings, voting and bylaws, giving members an accessible route outside their own board. Other provinces provide narrower remedies. Manitoba, for example, has a specialized appeal process for the termination of housing-co-op membership, while Ontario relies on more formal court or statutory investigation mechanisms for serious governance concerns.
As a condition of new federal funding, CMHC might require co-operatives to establish a clear escalation process and tell members where they can seek independent review when internal remedies are exhausted.
Provinces without an accessible forum for co-operative governance disputes should consider creating one or extending an existing tribunal’s mandate. These should be designed with a low barrier for access, with plain language guidance and practical assistance for members who need help navigating the process, such as translation or interpretation services and accessibility accommodations.
Government does not need to start from scratch. Co-operative federations and the Agency for Co-operative Housing already provide substantial governance resources. The opportunity is to engage the directors and members of new co-operatives with these resources from the beginning, rather than expecting them to seek those resources only after problems emerge.
All of these measures should be refined as the new co-operatives mature. The agency already holds data on operations and performance, while CMHC and the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council support a national research network designed to connect housing research with policy and program development.
These proposed measures can also be improved over time. If they prove effective, similar approaches might be funded and adapted more broadly across the entire co-operative housing sector, not just the federally supported part.
Editor’s Note: The authors thank Philip Lillies for his substantial contributions to the research and development of earlier versions of this article.
