Montreal residents are ripping into city leadership, saying it’s ignoring their concerns while planning a new resource for homeless people.
This time, it’s happening in Ahuntsic-Cartierville, where the city recently announced plans for a 24-7 shelter in the middle of a residential neighbourhood just steps from a daycare and a residence for nuns.
“It’s a total disaster,” said local resident Rachel Rakhi. “It’s so non-democratic the way they have done it.”
She is one of hundreds of residents opposed to the recently-announced plan to create the resource for homeless people in an abandoned building on Bois-de-Boulogne Avenue. It will be able to accommodate up to 50 people, and the city says it should be operational by mid-August.
“It’s not that we don’t want to help these people, but this is not the right place,” said Rakhi.
In addition to the daycare there are several schools nearby. Sister Pierrette Bertrand of the Oblates Franciscaines de Saint-Joseph lives among other nuns in a building right next door.
“People are angry about how the decision was taken unilaterally,” she told Global News, saying many in the area have lost faith in city officials for imposing the project on them without consultation. She worries she’ll find people in crisis on her front porch.
The city held an information session on July 3rd where residents were able to ask questions, but the neighbourhood feels authorities have already made up their minds to go ahead.
“Don’t insult my intelligence by asking me what I’m concerned about. when you’re not going to do anything about it. You’re just going to make your decision and that’s it,” said Massimo Bono, who said he moved to the area three years ago.
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They’re not the first group of Montrealers to feel this way in recent months.
In Rosemont, parents have publicly feuded with the city over plans to turn the old Sainte-Bibiane Church into a shelter. In Saint-Henri, the Maison Benoit Labre has infuriated the neighbourhood.
Conservative Party Leader Pierre Poilievre is even piling on to the outrage.
“Justin Trudeau must immediately shut down this hard drug injection site, this drug den, to protect our children,” Poilievre said at a press conference in Saint-Henri on Friday.
Opposition city councillor Benoit Langevin says the Ahuntsic-Cartierville facility is a case of the Plante administration fumbling through a rushed decision. He says the resource could have been installed in a different area in a vacant, city-owned building.
“There are 14 in Ahuntsic Cartierville, how is it possible that we’re not prospecting these installations?” he told Global News, calling on municipal leadership to truly listen to citizen concerns.
During a heated conversation in front of the future site on Friday, resident Serge Villeneuve argued in favour of the shelter. He said resources need to go somewhere, and homeless people need to be shown compassion.
“I think it’s a good spot right here,” he told Rakhi.
Resilience Montreal executive director David Chapman told Global News all neighbourhoods are going to need to do their part to address a growing problem.
“There’s no neighbourhood in Canada that would say, ‘Our neighbourhood is the right place to put a homeless resource.’ Not one,” he said.
Chapman said the housed need to be listened to by authorities, but the unhoused need to be listened to as well.
“You would never, ever, ever want to trade childhoods with the average person who is homeless,” he said.
The city’s point man for homelessness, Robert Beaudry, said in a written statement that another information session is planned for next week, and the city will deploy measures to ensure a harmonious integration.
Residents gathered to discuss the issue on Thursday, and are planning to continue fighting. They have a petition with more than 900 signatures against the facility.
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