(Montreal) Deputy Prime Minister Geneviève Guilbault announced on Saturday that Quebec will grant $250 million over five years to fight against armed violence in Montreal.
Posted at 7:58
Updated at 1:14 p.m.
Some 450 additional police officers will also be hired over the same period.
Shootings have multiplied in the metropolis in recent months and the two murders last Tuesday, which occurred in broad daylight, in public places, once again shook Montrealers’ sense of security. In the space of 30 minutes, at lunchtime on Tuesday, a man was shot in the parking lot of the Rockland shopping center and another on the terrace of a pizzeria on Saint-Denis Street.
On Friday, Mayor Valérie Plante replied to people who accuse her of wanting to defund the police, assuring that it is false.
PHOTO PHILIPPE BOIVIN, THE PRESS
The Mayor of Montreal, Valérie Plante
She also refuted the allegations that amounts granted by the Government of Quebec for the Service de police de la Ville de Montréal had been used elsewhere.
“The money earmarked for the SPVM goes to the SPVM. The money earmarked for housing goes to housing. The money that is earmarked for the parks goes to the parks. Money is going to the right places. Our management is beyond reproach, ”she said in a press scrum.
Mme Plante also lamented that people “scare the world”.
“I’m tired of scaring the world, scaring the police and the police by saying that our administration wants to defund. It’s wrong ! It never happened and it never will […] That’s enough to scare the world, ”insisted Mayor Plante.