Posted at 11:00 a.m.
“Dad, is the housing crisis over? asked my 11-year-old, looking up from the screen on a July morning. He hadn’t heard anything about it on the news the day before, he said, and he hadn’t seen anything in The Press+ that morning. “Does the crisis only last three weeks? he wondered.
Although I am very happy that he is interested in the news and that I have the opportunity to discuss it with him, his question troubled me. Through the eyes of a citizen in the making, my boy raised the inexorable reality of the community environment.
Social crises do not only exist when they receive the attention of the media or politicians. For the people in vulnerable situations who experience them and for the community organizations that support these people, these crises are part of everyday life. They have no set duration.
No, the housing crisis is not a phenomenon that comes back every year, from June 15 to July 5, like a festival. This is a social issue that persists throughout the year, and has been for a long time.
If you talk about it with the leaders of the Greater Montreal Reference Center, which manages the 211 telephone help service, you will be told that for two years now, requests related to the housing crisis have been on a par with those concerning food insecurity.
I could talk about the why and how of this situation for several chronicles. Many explanations have recently been put forward in these pages. But we are no longer at the time of reflection and speeches: we must now act.
The good news is that the wheel is finally starting to turn in the right direction. In replying to my son, I mentioned to him that this year, the housing issue has been discussed in the media since April and that it is still present there late in July, in various forms. Several announcements of public investment in social and affordable housing have been made recently by the governments of Quebec and Canada.
The cities of Laval and Longueuil will hold a housing summit at the end of August. Montreal has launched an advisory committee on housing. The Montreal Metropolitan Community unveiled a very first housing policy, inviting the population to a public consultation. I add to these efforts the Foundation of Greater Montreal which, in collaboration with Centraide of Greater Montreal, will launch a report on housing in the fall.
The necessary conversation
Recently, I wrote here that we needed a big conversation about housing that would involve everyone in our community.
In this spirit, in June we launched the work of a working group on housing bringing together employees from different backgrounds.
A group for the defense of the rights of tenants, representatives of public health and cities of Greater Montreal who discuss together? I confirm it to you: it is brilliant!
We apply the basic principles of social innovation. Discussions focus first on establishing needs, then on developing solutions adapted to current problems. These solutions must be sustainable, and take into account the ecological transition.
It should be noted that we are not starting from existing projects or from vacant land available in a neighborhood. Nor do we ask ourselves how to meet the criteria of existing programs. The page is blank and we are in a logic outside the programs.
We base ourselves on the real needs of the 200,000 low-income households who spend at least 30% of their income on rent, as well as those of the 30,000 households on the waiting lists for low-income housing and rent supplements.
They are the ones who count and who are at the heart of our exchanges.
Another important question will have to be considered sooner or later: the financing of the projects. Our Working Group on Housing makes sure to share possible solutions, whether they come from here or from other cities or countries.
At the same time, I also participate in discussions with stakeholders in our community, including real estate developers and private foundations, who exchange ideas and inspiring initiatives. For example, why not think about financing plans that would integrate different variables for the same building? If a higher financial return is desired for a certain number of dwellings, others could generate lower profitability and be financed in part by philanthropic assets. These foundations would obtain a return on their capital, while tackling a major issue consistent with their mission.
Or, why not create a community trust that would “freeze” the status of a housing unit for several years, thus guaranteeing its affordability? These are ideas that are circulating and that could make it possible to bring together actors with very different profiles around the same social issue.
Let’s dream a little and get out of the shackles that we have imposed on ourselves over the years. Let’s recreate the blank page mentioned above. The many actors I have spoken to are ready.
Together, we can lay the first stones of a collective response to this major problem, which hinders the exercise of full citizenship for too many of us.
Next summer, my boy may still ask me if the housing crisis lasts three weeks. But until then, I make him the promise to strive to keep the issue very present in the public debate. And, above all, to work on concrete and inspiring solutions that will meet the hopes of citizens.