Montreal gearing up to provide more beds for city's homeless this winter
Mayor Valérie Plante says city’s homeless population has grown during pandemic
Montreal Mayor Valérie Plante says the city plans to make 400 more beds available for the homeless this winter.
According to Plante, the city's homeless population has grown during the pandemic, making it more difficult for the city to keep up with its needs.
In addition to 400 beds, the city will also open new drop-in shelters and provide shuttle transportation in an effort to double its usual winter offering for the homeless.
"It was important for us to talk with our different partners to find solutions to increase the number of beds, keeping in mind the bad weather and the cold coming up," Plante said at the beginning of a news conference updating the pandemic situation in the city Wednesday.
During the summer, the city made more than 300 beds available across three locations — on top of the nearly 350 it added in the spring at shelters across the city.
Plante says the city will unveil more details about its latest plan in the coming days.
'We refuse people every night'
Some people who work directly with the homeless say long lineups of people either looking for a warm meal or a place to sleep have become more common during the pandemic.
"We're full every night and we refuse people every night," said Michel Monette, the director of CARE Montreal in Mercier-Hochelaga-Maisonneuve.
Monette expects those lineups to get longer this coming winter, in part because he doesn't expect the outdoor homeless encampment on Notre-Dame Street, east of downtown, to hold up much longer.
"At the first storm, 10 centimetres of wet snow, the tent will not resist. So there are a bunch of tents that will just collapse, and so it brings people into shelters," he said.
The Welcome Hall Mission will manage the bulk of the 400 new beds announced by the city.
CEO Sam Watts says the mission has already started hiring and training more staff to help over the winter.
"That's in the context of a staff that we have that's already overworked due to the pandemic," he said.
With files from Matt D'Amours