The mayoress of Montreal lamented Tuesday that the decontamination of industrial land in eastern Montreal is not progressing quickly enough and asked their owners to act without delay.
Valérie Plante affirmed that all possible measures had been put in place by Montreal and the Government of Quebec – with an investment of 100 million – to facilitate the revitalization of these immense lands. The ball is now in the landowners’ court, she said.
“The piece we want to move faster is decontamination,” she said to the guests of the East Montreal Chamber of Commerce (CCEM). “I wish it would go faster. ”
His administration launched a mobilization campaign, with the CCEM, to encourage owners of contaminated land to take advantage of the subsidies and tax advantages offered. It is a “generous financial assistance”, underlined Mme Plant.
She added that some owners wait for a project to take place on their land before investing in its revitalization. It is “counter-intuitive”, she admitted, but the program of Montreal and the government of Quebec promotes the opposite equation: decontamination first, project then.
Earlier this year, Minister Chantal Rouleau publicly deplored the slow pace of decontamination work in East Montreal, blaming the municipal administration. Quebec invested 100 million in 2019 for this project, promising a second payment of 100 million in the medium term.
“The mayoress does not have the passing grade for decontamination in the east of Montreal. […] At the moment, we should see land being decontaminated, but this is not the case, ”asserted the minister in an interview to Press last March. “The money that was invested in the City is still in the City coffers and is not used for decontamination. ”