Retired literary critic Jean-Roch Boivin died at the age of 79 last month, a few weeks after suffering “a most ferocious renoviction”, according to his obituary, published recently in the pages of the Duty. The rooming house where the Montrealer resided was emptied of almost all of its low- and middle-income occupants, despite the special status of the building. The last tenant in place, a Syrian refugee, continues to fight for his right to remain in the premises.
For more than 30 years, Mr. Boivin, who notably wrote in the pages of the Duty and the defunct magazine See, lived in the same small apartment located just opposite the Square Saint-Louis, in a building that has 15. However, it was bought at the beginning of last July by the real estate company Modela, represented by promoter Tristan Desautels, who owns buildings in Montreal and Estrie. The developer quickly began to sign lease termination agreements with some of the eight tenants of the three-storey building in order to carry out major work there.
Mr. Boivin, like Wasim Osman, who still lives in this building to this day, is one of the few tenants who then refused to leave the premises in exchange for an amount, proposed by the owner, which amounted to approximately $600.
The owner then multiplied the means of pressure to try to force these tenants to agree to terminate their lease, in particular by threatening to call the firefighters to evict them, as reported by Radio-Canada last September. The owner also asked a worker to pierce the roof of the building in several places on August 8, which caused significant water damage in Mr. Osman’s accommodation, which had to be evacuated temporarily, as in testify to the documents filed with the Administrative Housing Tribunal (TAL).
“It was a stunt,” says Mr. Osman. The City of Montreal has also confirmed to the Duty subsequently pinning the owners of the building for work carried out without a permit last August.
I am convinced, like his family, that it was really the stress of all this that killed him, downright
A few months of calm followed, during which renovations ceased in the building. Then, the owners obtained permits from the City to carry out various works in the building while maintaining the same number of apartments. After negotiating with Tristan Desautels, Mr. Boivin finally obtained financial compensation of $10,000 from him, in exchange for the termination of his lease, as evidenced by the agreement provided to the Duty by relatives of the deceased.
The 79-year-old tenant thus moved on 1er February in a new apartment in the Plateau-Mont-Royal, after several anxiety-provoking days where he feared not to find an apartment in the area up to his means, says his friend Anne Dandurand, who rubbed shoulders with Mr. Boivin for 41 years. “He finally managed to find accommodation at the last minute, a week maximum before the 1er February, in an old block of flats where the administration was very sensitive to the fact that he was going to be on the street,” she confides. Jean-Roch Boivin, however, was only able to enjoy his accommodation for two weeks. On February 14, he was taken to the CHUM, where he died five days later.
“I am convinced, like his family, that it is really the stress of all this that killed him, downright”, loose Mme Dandurand, in reference to the eviction suffered by Mr. Boivin.
Only one tenant
Wasim Osman, who fled Syria in 2016 to settle in Montreal, continues to live in his one-room apartment, for which he pays $635 a month, while around him, a construction site is in progress. He can also see the work in a neighboring dwelling from cracks that have formed in the wall of his home, noted The duty visiting the places. The neighboring apartment, where Jean-Roch Boivin once lived, is already a shadow of what it was, while the dust accumulates in the building, of which several windows are boarded up.
Mr. Osman is now suing Tristan Desautels before the TAL in the hope of obtaining financial compensation of tens of thousands of dollars for the “harassment” and “trouble and inconvenience” he claims to have suffered in recent months. But what he especially wants is to obtain an agreement that will allow him to return to his apartment after the work that the owner wishes to carry out there over the next 10 months, as provided for by law in the case of temporary evacuations.
City of Montreal documents obtained by The duty also show that a request for a permit to transform the rooming house into an “apartment building” was refused last November. The Plateau-Mont-Royal urban planning by-law prohibits this type of conversion to protect rooming houses, often considered the last defense against homelessness.
The owner then applied for new permits, this time for major repairs that would not change the building’s class and number of dwellings. These permits were granted to him last month and provide for 10 months of work in the building.
A “social vocation” threatened
Reached by phone and email, Tristan Desautels did not answer any of our questions. It was therefore impossible to know, in particular, what the rents will be after the refurbishment.
“The social vocation of this rooming house, it will disappear completely. Because yes, it may be a rooming house, but with rent at $1,500 for a small studio, that’s not what it used to be,” predicts housing lawyer Daniel Crespo Villarreal, which represents Wasim Osman. However, the City has no power over the rents charged in rooming houses.
“Unfortunately, in this very specific case, we have no municipal leverage that would allow us to go further,” wrote Councilor Marie Sterlin, who is responsible for housing for the borough of Plateau- Mont Royal. The office of the Mayor of Montreal, Valérie Plante, believes that it “is becoming urgent to revise the provisions of the Civil Code of Quebec to reverse the burden of proof that is currently on tenants to better protect them from evictions and illegal repossessions. of accommodation”.
I am convinced, like his family, that it was really the stress of all this that killed him, downright