CAMBRIDGE, ON | February 2026 – One year after opening the doors to Cambridge’s first and only women’s emergency homeless shelter, YWCA Cambridge is releasing a sobering look at the state of homelessness in the region. Between February 2025 and February 2026, the shelter provided 6,921 bed nights, operating at an average 94.25% capacity for the duration of the year.
While the shelter was designed to address an urgent need, the data collected over the last 12 months reveals a deepening crisis that exceeds the shelter’s current resources. Since August 2025 alone, YWCA Cambridge has recorded over 160 requests for service that they were unable to accommodate due to lack of space.
“This first year has been a reckoning,” says Kim Decker, CEO of YWCA Cambridge. “We aren’t here to celebrate an anniversary, but to sound the alarm. We are seeing women over the age of 50—many homeless for the first time in their lives—and an overrepresentation of Indigenous women. Our 20 beds are a lifeline, but they are not a solution to the systemic failures that are pushing women into homelessness.”
YWCA Cambridge’s year-end data highlights several critical trends in the Cambridge community:
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The Aging Face of Homelessness: In December 2025, 67% of clients were aged 50 and older, often driven into homelessness by the gender wage gap, inadequate pensions, or the loss of a partner who was the primary earner.
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Systemic Inequity: While Indigenous people make up less than 3% of the provincial population, they represented 26% of unique individuals served by the shelter this year.
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A Need for a Continuum: 20% of clients achieved “successful outcomes,” which YWCA Cambridge defines beyond permanent housing to include long-term care, substance use treatment, and culturally appropriate transitional housing.
YWCA Cambridge is using this milestone to call on all levels of government for immediate, collaborative investment in a full spectrum of housing. This includes low-barrier drop-in spaces, deeply affordable housing with built-in supports for seniors, and a dedicated family shelter for women and children. Currently, these forms of housing and supports are nonexistent in Cambridge. The nonprofit organization also continues its search for a permanent location for their shelter which is temporarily located in the basement of Grace Bible Church.
“We have proven that 24/7, trauma-informed, wrap-around support works. It builds the trust necessary for women to move toward stability,” added Decker. “But we cannot move women through the system if there is nowhere for them to go. We need more than just emergency beds; we need a community-wide commitment to meaningful, permanent housing solutions.”
For more information on YWCA Cambridge emergency shelter and how to support their ongoing advocacy and frontline work, visit ywcacambridge.ca
About YWCA Cambridge:.
YWCA Cambridge is a charitable, non-profit organization dedicated to providing responsive programming and services that meet the changing needs of women, girls and gender-diverse individuals. As a member agency of YWCA Canada, YWCA Cambridge is part of a national movement known as the country’s oldest and largest women’s multi-service organization, the largest national provider of shelter, literacy, life skills, employment and counselling programs, and is the second largest provider of child care services in Canada.
For more information: Roz Gunn, Director of Communications and Advocacy, at r.gunn@ywcacambridge.ca.
