MONTREAL -- Montreal Mayor Valerie Plante said there are enough places to accommodate homeless people, who need to find shelter during this period of extreme cold.
"The places, they are available," said Plante in a news briefing on Tuesday. "What you need to know is that if people arrive and there are no more places and a shelter is at capacity, that person will not sleep outside. The shelter can connect with a shuttle service and that person will be warm."
The mayor mentioned that there are more than 1,500 places available to accommodate people experiencing homelessness in Montreal. An additional 300 places will be added to that in a soccer centre located in the Saint-Michel district starting Thursday.
The sports centre will accommodate people who must isolate themselves due to COVID-19, as the virus circulates widely among the homeless population.
The mayor's intervention comes a day after the death of a 74-year-old man. The man lived in a camp between Saint-Jacques St. and Highway 20 in the Notre-Dame-de-Grace neighbourhood. The coroner is investigating.
The cold weather is a concern for organizations that support homeless people, who are at risk by spending the night outside as the mercury plummets.
Dr. Horacio Arruda, who announced his resignation as Quebec's director of public health on Monday evening, called on homeless organizations to ignore COVID-19 for the next few nights.
He had asked shelters to open their rooms "according to the capacity established before the pandemic, regardless of the outbreak status of the environment."
The message was well received in the community, where people were already on alert Monday night as the temperature dropped rapidly.
-- This report by The Canadian Press was first published in French on Jan. 11, 2022.
