It is no coincidence that the Mayor of Montreal chose to present her “collective intervention strategy for the Village” at the Parc de l’Espoir. It takes hope to imagine the Village emerging from the slump in which it has been plunged for several years.
Gone are the days when we walked around smiling, with a light heart, under the multicolored balls of landscape architect Claude Cormier.
Today, passers-by tend to pick up the pace, when they don’t avoid the neighborhood altogether.
In 2017, in the pages of The Press, we welcomed the opening of a new generation of businesses between the Beaudry and Papineau metro stations. Today, traders and restaurateurs are expressing their insecurity and talking about the challenge of recruiting staff. Some are threatening to close their terraces as the summer season is just beginning.
What happened ?
The pandemic happened, among other things. And this pandemic has exacerbated vulnerabilities that were already present.
Last summer, the borough and its partners held a series of forums on the upcoming redevelopment of rue Sainte-Catherine Est. The strategy presented on Thursday is the result of this consultation. There are four priorities, the first of which, safety, is obvious.
We need to restore a sense of security in this sector. We also want to animate the neighborhood and occupy public space. We are also multiplying the police and community presence in the streets and parks. These are all good initiatives.
More worrying is this idea of creating a new governance structure that will bring together all the stakeholders in the community. Let’s hope we don’t add heaviness where the most agility is needed.
That said, let’s be realistic: the roadmap presented on Thursday is not a magic wand. Miracle solutions do not exist in the face of such complex issues. The Village is a concentrate of human misery, a microcosm of the problems that we observe on a larger scale in society: poverty, addiction, mental health problems, homelessness…
No city government can solve all of this on its own. It is a long-term task that requires the participation of all levels of government, in addition to community and business circles. And above all, it takes patience, even if it is starting to run out.
Today it’s the merchants of the Village who are speaking, but by the end of the summer, we could well hear those from downtown, Milton-Parc or Villeray. Homelessness is more visible than ever in the metropolis and the problems are just beginning.
What Montreal is experiencing, all major North American cities have experienced and are still experiencing.
From Toronto to Vancouver via Portland and New York, several approaches have been tried over the years to pacify relations between the different populations that frequent a neighborhood: adding police presence in the streets, hiring security guards around restaurant terraces, distribution of food to itinerant people. The results have been, at best, mixed.
The only approach that seems to give convincing and long-term results is that of providing a roof for those who do not have one. The positive effects of a housing strategy accompanied by targeted social services are very real and have been documented.
Montreal may well invent all the strategies in the world, without the participation of Quebec and Ottawa to intervene on the ground in housing, health and social services, we will not get out of it.
In a speech before the Chamber of Commerce last May, the Minister responsible for the Metropolis, Pierre Fitzgibbon, undertook to restore the Latin Quarter to its former glory, declaring that he was making it a personal matter.
But there is no invisible border along rue Saint-Hubert. The problems of the Village and those of the Latin Quarter are similar in several respects. So let’s hope that Mr. Fitzgibbon opens his heart and embraces the Village in his concerns. Let’s also hope that he campaigns with his colleagues to flood Sainte-Catherine Street, between Saint-Laurent Boulevard and Papineau Avenue, with love and support.
Miracles don’t happen, but it would be nice to celebrate some small victories next summer.