MONTREAL - Dozens of people are being forced out of their homes in Hochelaga-Maisonneuve after the Montreal Fire Department deemed their building unsafe.
The landlord of the Moreau Lofts called in the police on Friday morning to assist with the eviction.
City inspectors visited the building at the corner of Ontario and Moreau several times in recent months and advised the landlord that the building was not suitable for habitation.
The 15 tenants who live in the building received notices to leave in June and the landlord tried to get them to move out on Sept. 3.
That attempt failed and protesters supporting the artists set up a squatters' camp nearby, leading some to criticize the encampment.
“People who are drinking, partying at the same time,” said neighbor Lisanne Clement, describing the squatters. “At one point they were sitting on my stairs, I had to call police to ask them to leave.”
When the landlord tried to get his tenants to leave on Friday morning, he called police after being confronted by the artists and the protesting squatters and mediators talked to the crowd for two hours before convincing them to pack up and leave the area.
By the afternoon, the squatters' camp had been dismantled and carted away.
Several of the squatters and their supporters were bitter about expulsions.
“This is a landlord who could not care less about the safety of this tenants and now he calls police on them,” said affordable housing advocate Jonathan Aspireault-Masse.
The Moreau Lofts has been used as a workplace and residence for artists for several decades.
The landlord said he wants to renovate the property in order to make it habitable but maintain it as a loftspace.
It's a plan which the local authorities are supporting.
“The landlord put forward two plans and he projects to invest $1 million to restore and he is willing to have an artist studio, that's good news,” said Hochelaga-Maisonneuve Borough Mayor Real Menard.
