The construction of dozens of social housing units is threatened in Montreal for lack of funding, and the City is asking Quebec to put more money on the table so that they can see the light of day.
In Parc-Extension, work to convert a Bétonel paint factory into around 30 affordable social housing units was to start later this year or early next year, explains the To have to Emanuel Guay, researcher associated with the Comité d’action de Parc-Extension (CAPE), the neighborhood housing committee, and who is collaborating on the project.
“It was very advanced, expenses had already been incurred in this project,” he says. Architects had been hired, and we were counting on public funding which, ultimately, might not materialize.
According to our information, representatives of the Service de l’habitation de Montréal made a presentation last week, and the project, like several others, was given a red color code, which means that the financing is not tied up, for lack of money.
Two-thirds of the housing was intended for families, and the last social housing project in Parc-Extension dates back to 2015, underlines the coordinator of the CAPE, Amy Darwish.
“There is a huge need in the neighborhood. Many tenants face evictions and abusive rent increases. It’s a project that has been greeted with great hope,” she says. She believes that the fault lies with Quebec, which did not pay enough money. “We can’t afford to wait or have it cancelled. It is now that the tenants of Parc-Extension need social housing,” she adds.
More money claimed
In an email sent to To have to, Alicia Dufour, press officer for the office of the mayor of Montreal and the executive committee, specifies that nearly 3,000 social housing units are under development in the AccèsLogis Québec and AccèsLogis Montréal programs. Grants for the AccèsLogis Montréal program come from the Société d’habitation du Québec and the Montreal Metropolitan Community.
“With our community partners, we are working hard on financial arrangements and on additional sources of funding that would allow the projects to move forward,” writes Alicia Dufour. “While some projects should soon be able to be carried out, others will only be able to move forward if the Government of Quebec funds them to the extent of their budgetary needs,” she underlines.
She insists on the fact that “the City has not abandoned the projects in question”. “The desire to see these projects emerge from the ground is still very present, but funding from the Government of Quebec is essential for them to come true,” she says.
She adds that the sums already allocated to Montreal to release the projects “cannot be fully used due to administrative rules in Quebec”. “We have been in discussion for many months already so that relaxations are finally applied by the government,” she said.
Quebec granted $30 million to Montreal in its last budget, out of an amount of $247 million, which should enable the delivery of 3,500 social and affordable housing units in Quebec through the AccèsLogis program.
Before receiving this sum of money, the City had assessed the shortfall at $265 million for projects under development. Invited to react, the cabinet of the Ministry of Municipal Affairs and Housing of Quebec (MAMH) maintains for its part that “the 30 million dollars granted to Montreal responded to its requests”.
Montreal was unable to tell the To have to how many social housing units currently need financing.
Côte-des-Neiges
In Côte-des-Neiges, the housing committee affirms for its part that two projects totaling more than 150 housing units are no longer considered “priority” by the City. “We are a borough with a lot of needs,” says Darby MacDonald, community organizer for Project Genesis.
For her, it is not only the Quebec government that must assume responsibility for the file. “It’s also a problem in Montreal, because the City has targeted an already marginalized neighborhood to remove projects, and it’s appalling,” she says.
The units are intended for people on waiting lists to access low-income housing and low-income people at risk of becoming homeless, she said.
She finds it hard to see how it would be possible to finance them otherwise. “It’s really difficult because there are a lot of restrictions on where the funding comes from. Our hands are tied. The money must come from public funds, but there is no more money available,” she says.
The press secretary for the Minister of MAMH, Bénédicte Trottier Lavoie, affirms for her part that, since the Montreal Reflex Agreement, “the Government of Quebec has paid 500 million dollars to the City for housing, and the latter can use these sums as it wishes within its programs”.
It is pointed out that Quebec has invested “colossal sums” in housing and that the government intends to “continue to invest to build, throughout Quebec, social and affordable housing”.
“Hundreds of new affordable housing units” will be announced in the coming weeks as part of the Quebec Affordable Housing Program, which was set up last February. The construction of some of them will begin this summer.