Emergency homeless shelter to move from Chinatown to Verdun

Editor's Note: Verdun Mayor Marie-Andrée Mauger has since clarified the homeless shelter on Gordon Street is not a relocation of the one at Complexe Guy-Favreau in Chinatown.

An emergency homeless shelter will open in Montreal's Verdun borough this winter to take on those displaced by the closure of a busy facility in Chinatown.

Borough Mayor Marie-Andrée Mauger made the announcement Friday morning on Facebook. She said the new shelter, located at the former Jardins Gordon seniors' residence, will be temporary.

"Given the vulnerability crisis and the increase in homelessness across the metropolis, including Verdun and the greater southwest, the borough has agreed that this building will temporarily serve as an emergency accommodation service," she wrote.

The building on Gordon Street near Champlain Boulevard has been vacant since 2022.

Last June, city officials announced it would be converted into affordable housing.That's still the plan, according to Mauger, but it will serve as an emergency shelter in the meantime.

"It seemed immoral to us to leave a building vacant this winter rather than making it temporarily available to keep vulnerable people safe and warm," she wrote. 

 

Speaking to reporters Friday evening at Nuit des sans-abri, an annual event that educates the population about homelessness, Montreal Mayor Valérie Plante said opening the Verdun shelter was born out of necessity.

"For the City of Montreal, we cannot let people sleep in the streets," she stated. 

Like her Verdun counterpart, Mauger, she stressed that the shelter was temporary and would close at the end of winter, when construction of the temporary housing units will begin. 

REPLACING CHINATOWN'S SHELTER

The shelter at Jardins Gordon will serve as a replacement for the Guy-Favreau Complex facility in Chinatown, which is set to close at the end of October. For a while, it was unclear where those living at the shelter would go. 

The Guy-Favreau shelter was highly controversial, with Chinatown residents and business owners pointing to a rise in open drug use, harassment and violent crime in the neighbourhood. 

But advocates like Sam Watts, CEO of The Welcome Hall Mission, say simply shuffling vulnerable people off to a new location is not the answer. 

"This is a recipe for disaster as far as I'm concerned," he told CTV News, asserting that trying to relocate a homeless population often creates problems in two places instead of one. 

"What they need is a place to call home, and if we start to work on that, if that becomes our operating thinking model, we're going to be a whole lot better than if we're constantly trying to open up these very expensive, very disruptive temporary services." 

In a similar vein, Benoit Langevin, opposition critic for poverty and homelessness with Ensemble Montreal, said Friday that the current administration's approach to homelessness isn't sustainable.

He argued that short-term emergency shelters don't provide lasting help to vulnerable people.

"We're opening and closing these resources in neighbouring communities without thinking of being 24/7. 24/7 for what? For cohabitation issues, for the relationship social workers inside can create with this population that needs that care." 

A RESIDENTIAL STREET

With Friday's announcement, there are concerns among Verdun residents that those same issues in Chinatown will be transferred over.

"We're a residential area, lots of schools in the area, lots of small kids. So if there's a safety concern there [in Chinatown], why wouldn't there be one here as well?" Amy Biernat, who lives in the area, told CTV News. 

Gordon Street is largely made up of homes and apartments, with busy streets like Wellington and de l'Église a short walk away.

"Obviously, everybody has a right to live somewhere. However, already in the area, we're looking at a lot of concerns that we have for safety at night, for noise, specifically," Biernat added. 

Multiple residents told CTV News they weren't consulted about the plans and have many unanswered questions. 

Plante admitted Friday evening that the city was not ready for the news to come out. 

"We will being doing that work, because if we want to find social [harmony] it has to be done with a lot of communication and hearing concerns," she said. 

Marie-Andrée Mauger said on Facebook that a meeting with residents will take place in the coming weeks "to provide more information and answer your questions."

"We are working with all our partners (the city, Montreal police, the health network, community organizations) to ensure that the integration of the shelter goes well and to promote harmonious social coexistence." 

With files from Noovo Info's Véronique Dubé and CTV News' Matt Gilmour.