Homelessness taking centre stage in Montreal mayoral race

A pair of independent Montreal city councilors are planning to table a motion on Monday to get the city to declare a state of emergency on homelessness. A homeless encampment is shown in the east end of Montreal, Friday, Oct. 25, 2024. (Graham Hughes / The Canadian Press)

Municipal election campaigns are in full swing across Quebec, and in Montreal one issue stands out: the homelessness crisis.

Housing has been a hot topic for Montrealers in recent years with encampments popping up around the city and skyrocketing rents. An April census showed there was a 15 per cent increase in homelessness in Quebec, with nearly 42 per cent of sheltered homeless people in Montreal.

Projet Montréal leader Luc Rabouin says his top priority will be creating more transitional housing.

These kinds of units are designed to house people coming out of homelessness and are part of access to housing programs for several weeks as they wait for a permanent home.

A few days after the inauguration of Montreal’s first modular housing project, Rabouin is promising 1,000 more units.

“This is very critical in the continuum of services. There are people in a tent or even in a shelter who are ready to go to an apartment but there’s no apartment available,” said Rabouin at a news conference Wednesday.

The modular transitional housing model fills that gap while providing a safe environment.

Ensemble Montréal leader Soraya Martinez Ferrada said the city needs a stronger plan to end encampments.

On Wednesday, she pledged $120 million over four years to increase the number of outreach workers.

She said there needs to be more coordination when transitioning people from encampments to housing and accused the current administration of not acting fast enough on this issue.

“Either we find a solution to that, to make sure we give them alternatives for their basic needs as a human, or citizens nearby need to live with the impact of that,” she said.

“As a city, we have to have a protocol where we’re giving services in the transition where security is number one, cleanliness ... because at the end of the day we do not want encampments,” she added.

Earlier this week, Martinez Ferrada also promised to relax rules around short-term rentals like Airbnb — which Plante’s administration cracked down on, saying it contributed to the scarcity of affordable housing.

As a councillor, Transition Montréal leader Craig Sauvé has been outspoken on the urgency of acting on housing. His party will be putting out a comprehensive plan to tackle homelessness in the coming days.

Last November, he filed a motion calling on Montreal to declare a state of emergency on homelessness in an effort to create emergency shelters before winter hit.

Like Ensemble Montréal, his party wants to create more programs and implement stable, sustainable resources as well as increase the presence of outreach workers.

But, Sauvé said Transition Montréal wants to take a “human rights-based approach” rather than focus on dismantling encampments — or forced evictions, as he prefers to call them.

To do so without more money from Quebec, Transition is proposing to tax ultra-rich homeowners – whose property value exceeds $3.5 million – to add to its fund to tackle homelessness.

He says the tax could triple the amount in that fund.

“People who are experiencing homelessness have obviously been through a lot. They’re in survival mode. They’ve been traumatized numerous times. They are often losing faith in authorities,” he said.

“We have to establish support workers on site with the big encampments, provide services to people directly, hygienic services toilets ... so they can establish relationships with people and build the trust.”

A report released in June by Montreal’s public consultation office described a lack of leadership in the fight against homelessness and called on the city to boost resources for relevant community organizations.

The report explicitly said Montreal should stop dismantling homeless encampments until it develops a policy governing when and how they can be taken down.

That includes creating safer living conditions in the encampments by improving access to drinking water, toilets, waste collection and electricity.

Philippe Bourke, president of the consultation office, said dismantling encampments simply pushes the problem of chronic homelessness out of sight, without resolving it.

Futur Montréal and Action Montréal, newly formed parties, also include efforts to tackle homelessness in their platforms.

Futur Montréal says on its website it wants to consolidate and optimize resources and budgets for more than 60 community organizations and stakeholders working with homeless people in the city.

Action Montréal proposes a rent registry, supporting non-profit organizations in building social housing, harmonizing community forces and creating transitional centres.

With files from The Canadian Press