Nearly 200 households need shelter after moving day in Quebec: housing agency
MONTREAL — Nearly 200 Quebec households have been forced to seek temporary shelter after being unable to find new housing on the province’s annual move, the provincial housing agency said Saturday.
The Société d’habitation du Québec said of people who have contacted regional housing offices or their customer service for assistance, “178 households are currently being temporarily relocated, either with people in their neighborhood or in hotels.”
“Every effort is being made to ensure that no household that calls our assistance network is left on the street during this moving period,” it says in an email on Saturday.
Véronique Laflamme, a spokeswoman for the Quebec tenant group Front d’action Populaire en réaménagement urbain, said the number of people asking for help finding housing changed by the hour on Saturday.
She said her organization was aware of 680 tenant households who had not signed a new lease on Friday — the day the vast majority of leases in the province ended.
“That number is only a pale reflection of reality because it does not take into account households that have not yet registered,” she said in an interview Saturday. really meet their needs.
Prime Minister François Legault posted a message on social media on Saturday encouraging Quebec residents who need help finding a home to contact their local housing office.
Montreal Mayor Valérie Plante issued a similar message, telling Montreal residents to call 311 for help.
Laflamme said Quebec’s housing crisis — once confined to major centers — has become more widespread. She said tenants in smaller communities are now also struggling to find affordable housing for the first time.
Last year, she said, 620 households were unable to find a home by July 1.
According to landlord organization Corporation des propriétaires immobiliers du Québec, nearly 10 percent of tenants in the province will be moving on July 1.
The annual moving day is a remnant of a colonial period law that was intended to protect tenant farmers from winter evictions.
This report from The Canadian Press was first published on July 1, 2023.
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This story was produced with the financial support of the Meta and Canadian Press News Fellowship.
