Montreal Mayor Soraya Martinez Ferrada has announced that over the next two years, close to $50 million dollars will be spent to reduce homelessness in Montreal. About $20 million will be divided between various boroughs where the problem is acute. A further $29 million will go to frontline community groups that work with unhoused people.

These McGill experts can comment:

Pearl Eliadis, Associate Professor (professional), Faculty of Law and Chair of the Quebec Homelessness Prevention Collaborative (a collaboration with the Max Bell School of Public Policy), Max Bell School of Public Policy, Centre for Human Rights and Legal Pluralism can speak about comprehensive legal reforms being proposed by the Quebec Homelessness Prevention Collaborative. These are designed to move away from the current crisis-response mode toward a better co-ordinated approach focused on prevention.

pearl.eliadis [at] mcgill.ca (English, French)

Jayne Malenfant, Assistant Professor, Department of Integrated Studies in Education, can speak about what they see as the program’s failure to address financialization of housing and affordability; examples of municipally designated encampments and policing of unhoused communities in other cities; co-habitation and harm reduction; the perspectives of people living in encampments and those working in the community sector; and July 1 and housing precarity for Montrealers.

jayne.malenfant [at] mcgill.ca (English, French)