On October 23, Paul St-Pierre Plamondon released plans to fulfill his first campaign promise as Premier: allocating an additional 28 million dollars to the 48 million provincial budget to operate warming shelters for unhoused people this winter. Around 16 to 18 million dollars of this budget will be set aside for Montreal, which, according to The Montreal Gazette, encompasses around 5,000 unhoused people as of last year, almost half of Quebec’s unhoused population.
However, funding only goes so far. “Homelessness becomes a municipal issue when it appears in public spaces, though it starts long before then,” says Mélanie Fournier, a PhD student in psychology at UQAM. There are individual and structural factors at play that can determine housing situations, including: low income or unemployment, rent inflation, immigration complications, social reintegration after incarceration or hospitalization, unstable relationships and domestic violence, addiction, and mental illness.
Investing in warming shelters is not enough, as shelters and homes are not synonymous. This distinction is especially pertinent for “situational” or “hidden homelessness,” where people seek shelter in their vehicles, hotels, and other forms of temporary housing. Nonetheless, some individuals find themselves in the visible category of being unhoused, falling under cyclical or chronic subtypes. These groups may find themselves inhabiting makeshift shelters and abandoned infrastructure, leaving them unhoused for longer. Since having access to temporary housing does not guarantee safety, invisible homelessness can quickly become visible. This also extends to resource access. Despite having access to warming centres and temporary shelters, some, like Jocelyn Motard, prefer makeshift “cabin-like” shelters away from the heart of the city. This allows Motard to avoid precarious social interactions or squabbles with other unhoused individuals. “[These shelters] are the kind of place[s] that you can find a lot of darkness,” he says. While the city of Montreal invests in winter warming centres, access to these shelters is not universal, even with street outreach teams responsible for communicating with and directing unhoused people to them.
Nonetheless, warming centres can be vital to the survival of unhoused peoples amid declining temperatures. Without them, makeshift heat sources in encampments pose fire risks which, if not monitored, can quickly turn life-threatening. This was the case last month at the Notre-Dame encampment, where 180 unhoused people presently reside, when an unhoused woman died following a fire at the Notre-Dame encampment. These improvised heat sources are most often propane-fuelled garbage fires, but solar panels and generators have also been used. As a result, these encampments can become municipal fire hazards, requiring what fire service chief Martin Guilbault calls “case-by-case” reviews. If a makeshift warming centre is found to pose a fire risk, it is supposed to be taken down for “people’s safety.” This approach begs the question of how safety is defined and whose is deemed more important. Devint, a resident of the Notre-Dame encampment, says his biggest safety concern is the encampment being dismantled after last month’s tragedy, which would leave him vulnerable as winter comes. According to CBC, the city of Montreal has cleared out the area multiple times in the past. This makes their promise to withhold from tearing down the encampment in the future seem disingenuous.
The new budget, however, aspires to prevent history from repeating itself by shifting to 24-hour, municipally-regulated shelters at designated locations. Coinciding with Premier Plamondon’s campaign promise, Montreal mayor Soraya Martínez Ferrada announced the opening of “nine warming centres [equipped with beds] across seven boroughs.” This could be significant not only in mitigating the effects of “cold snaps” on the unhoused population, but also in serving as gateways to other social services and aid. Examples of this are the Canadian Red Cross centres in Ville Saint-Laurent and Plateau-Mont-Royal, and the Centre des femmes de convictions de Montréal, which is opening a new warming shelter in Rosemont–La Petite-Patrie exclusively for unhoused women.
While the provincial government of Quebec has announced they will provide financial aid for warming centres in Montreal, the opening of these centres is conditional on the recruitment of operating organizations and staff, and on communication with residents around the designated centres. In the meantime, there are several actions Montreal residents can take to support the unhoused population this upcoming winter.
One way to help street outreach teams is to stay informed about local warming centres on the City of Montreal’s website and by calling 311 to “inquire about these centres and report sanitation issues.” Additionally, one can donate clothes and winter gear, either directly to unhoused individuals or through an organization such as Chez Doris, Angels of Mercy, or Mission Old Brewery. Donating non-perishable goods or volunteering at soup kitchens and food banks like Moisson Montreal are other ways to get involved. Closer to campus, students may choose to volunteer on cleanup crews or donate hygiene products at The Open Door Montreal drop-in centre on Parc Avenue. Concerning actionable steps on campus, students can support McGill’s annual fundraising for the Centraide Campaign, an initiative to combat food insecurity and the housing crisis. While donations can be made directly through the Centraide of Greater Montreal website, McGill is hosting fundraising events for the organization. Returning this year is the second annual Pet Photo Contest, with a cash submission fee to participate and/or vote —voting is open from November 15 until December 13.
Ultimately, while increased government funding does not provide a permanent solution to the structural conditions surrounding unhoused individuals, this financial initiative can be strengthened by partnering with local efforts in and around our campus. These government measures complement pre-existing aid organizations and services — keeping people warm this winter is the immediate goal, while combating food insecurity and the housing crisis is the long-term objective.