“This winter, I heated my tent with candles. The fire caught two or three times. »
André lets out a contained laugh. Next to him are his meager possessions, a bicycle on which a box seems to contain some clothes. Met in an outdoor public place in the Rosemont district of Montreal, he is smoking a cigarette, a large empty bottle of vegetable juice placed in front of him.
Since October, André Troalen, 67, has been living in Léon-Provancher Park, near the Botanical Garden. He spent the rainy winter and spring in his tent. But last Tuesday, he was forced by the borough to leave the place. Street workers, police and city officials were present to oversee the operation. André picked up his things and left the scene without making a fuss and without knowing where he would go next.
While André remembers this morning, two pedestrians pass in the street: “Hey, hi André, they throw him cheerfully. How are you ? »
“I’m fine,” he mumbles unenthusiastically, since after all, it’s not. André is a regular in the neighborhood; people know him and many like him. Until October, he lived in an apartment building near the park, but he could no longer pay the rent and had problems with his landlord. Before, he says that he was a greenhouse producer in Saint-Agapit.
“Sleeping in a tent isn’t total comfort,” he says in a low voice, euphemistically, the ambient rain burying his almost inaudible words. His tent, moreover, did not survive the harsh winter.
Luckily, a resident of the neighborhood mobilized her network to provide her with another. “A donor, who wanted to remain anonymous, gave me money so that I could buy her a new tent,” explains Véronique, who launched an appeal for everyone on her Facebook account to help André. She has seen him regularly since October, since she lives near the park. In an interview, she says that everything was fine until the arrival of two other homeless people in the last few weeks.
“They were more problematic. If there had been only André in the park, there would have been no problem, because he really did not bother, she believes. But since the arrival of the other two, I found syringes on the ground. »
The authorities therefore placed a sign in the park telling the three men that they should leave the premises on Tuesday, July 12, at 8 a.m. “The workers and the police came to talk to André and offered him accommodation resources, but he doesn’t want to know anything,” she explains. According to what André has told him in recent months, he has already tried to use these resources, but he did not like the most restrictive rules, such as the obligation to return before a certain time.
“I’m not saying he’s perfect. He drinks, but he is not aggressive. I think he needs a conciliatory owner who offers him a chance in a small, unpretentious accommodation,” says Véronique.
The dismantling debate
The borough of Rosemont–La Petite-Patrie refused our interview request. The communication officer Katia Decorde nevertheless provided certain indications by email: “Camping in the parks is prohibited by regulation. We have also received complaints from the surrounding population. These homeless people had also connected themselves to the electricity of the chalet in the park, which constituted a risk. »
She adds that “encampments are not a safe or sustainable solution” and that “during any dismantling, each camper who wishes is met and directed to resources”.
Opting for the dismantling of camps in public places, however, does not convince the community organizer at the Support Network for Single and Homeless People in Montreal, Catherine Marcoux. “It uproots people who live in the neighborhood and who lose their personal belongings, it pushes them to isolate themselves and hide,” she laments. Mme Marcoux denounces the lack of “compassion” of the City which, according to her, has chosen to “systematically dismantle the camps”.
“The City says it’s for security reasons, but is it really safer to uproot people and increase their psychological distress? she wonders. For its part, the Montreal Police Department confirmed by email that officers from neighborhood station 44 intervened at Léon-Provancher Park. “It was essentially about referencing and not about repression,” says communications officer Anik de Repentigny.
As for André, he preferred not to divulge the place where he would sleep during the next nights. ” I am cautious. I’m not taking a chance,” he simply says, visibly afraid of being expelled again. However, her current precarious situation does not prevent her from aspiring to a more stable daily life and a real home.
“In a few weeks, I may have a nice apartment,” he recalls, a bit dreamy.