Roaming in Montreal | Encampments will not be tolerated, says the City

The City of Montreal will not tolerate “organized” encampments of homeless people on its territory, but the organizations that work with them warn that there will be more and more tents in the urban landscape in the coming weeks , a consequence of the housing crisis.

Isabelle Ducas
The Press

“Small camps have popped up all over town and will become more numerous and visible as the weather improves,” said James Hughes, President and CEO of the Old Brewery Mission.

Sébastien* knows something about it: he found himself on the street for the first time on the 1^er last April, after having cohabited with three other people, following his divorce, in a four and a half at $1,200 a month, in the Hochelaga-Maisonneuve district. “There were too many people in the accommodation, it was a fight, I was tired,” he says, discouraged.

Unaware of the services available to the homeless, he pitched his tent on a gravel lot along busy Notre-Dame Street. At that time, seven or eight people had taken up residence there, he explains. A few have left in the last few days.

To make matters worse, the driver of a municipal truck crushed his tent a few days ago. He must therefore find another, he says, when we meet him on the ground strewn with carcasses of bicycles, shreds of tents, old mattresses, beer cans and other rubbish.

Avoid evictions

Other camps have appeared under a highway, near Atwater Avenue, along Viger Street, near the Place-d’Armes metro station and elsewhere in the city. “We don’t want to specify where, because we want to prevent the city from evicting them,” says Michel Monette, director general of CARE Montreal.

Because indeed, the municipal administration “will not tolerate the organized camps of several tents”, indicates Marikym Gaudreault, press attaché of the mayoress Valérie Plante.

The councilor responsible for homelessness on the executive committee, Josefina Blanco, refused our request for an interview, but in a written statement, she notes the security risks for those who choose to pitch their tent in the city.

“Last summer, we avoided the worst when a fire could have caused the explosion of a propane tank in the middle of a residential area. If the Montreal Fire Department deems the site unsafe or if there are other issues related to civil security, it will order its evacuation,” explains Ms.^me White.

However, she assures that “these operations carried out by the social workers are carried out with great sensitivity. They act gradually and humanely while respecting the dignity of vulnerable people.”

Act as soon as a tent appears

According to Benoit Langevin, spokesman for the official opposition at city hall on homelessness, however, action should be taken as soon as a tent appears, and options should be offered to homeless people.

“It’s a horror film that we have seen in the last two years, he protests. We cannot let people occupy public space and break municipal bylaws without doing anything. »

He blames the lack of consistency in the services offered to homeless people.

According to Michel Monette, there will be 300 less accommodation places in Montreal this summer than last winter.

The shelter administered by his organization, which previously offered 120 places at the Hôtel Royal Versailles, had to reduce its capacity to 70 places by moving to the basement of the Sainte-Jeanne-d’Arc church at the beginning of month.

This lack of places will push more and more people towards the public space, which also gives them more freedom, since the shelters impose a large number of regulations on their clientele. “It’s nicer to have control over your life than to have someone controlling it for you,” observes Mr. Monette.

* Our interlocutor preferred not to mention his surname.