Montreal artists facing eviction after winning battle to build park in Mile-Ex

Frances Foster's walls are covered with canvases. Charcoal and pastel sketches are scattered around the flower pots and books on the table. The paintings are testament to the years she has spent honing her craft.

The space — a high-ceilinged art studio on the third floor of what was once a factory — isn't just where Foster makes her creations.

Foster, 64, is one of the two remaining artists who call the place home. The other resident is 72-year-old Trevor Goring. Both have lived in the building for the last 30 years.

On their doorstep, in the vacant lot just across the street, the artists' most recent triumph is underway: Gorilla Park — a green space that, according to the city of Montreal, will revegetate over three-quarters of the area's natural environment and include more than 1,500 trees and shrubs.

In 2013, the two artists founded Friends of Gorilla Park, a group dedicated to bringing the green space back to Mile-Ex — or as they prefer to call it, Marconi-Alexandra — after the trees there were razed.

But after the 10-year fight, neither Foster nor Goring may be around to enjoy its inauguration.

On Nov. 11, the same week the two found out the park was going to be built, they received eviction notices from their landlord.

"I've put down my roots in this community. I came here when I was 34. It was pretty much an abandoned neighborhood," said Foster.

The owner at the time wanted to create a hub for the arts community and co-operative housing, but the building eventually changed hands, she says.

About a year after she moved in, the building was rezoned and designated as an industrial/commercial property, but she and about a dozen other artists who lived in their art studios continued to inhabit the building until the eviction notices came.

However, unlike the others, Foster and Goring had residential leases.

For Foster, who tends to seniors at the Jewish Eldercare Centre CHSLD, moving out isn't an option.

"I couldn't do it. I'm what you call low-income," she said.

Leaving would not only mean losing out on her $660 rent but also being severed from the community for whom she campaigned to usher in the park.

Goring's story is much the same.

"When I first moved into the building years ago, it was a shell. I designed my own space. I supplied everything in it, [including] the toilets," said Goring.

"It would be ironic, to be thrown out of a community that one has devoted one's time and resources and energy to," he said, adding that the people who now work at the artificial intelligence companies in the neighbourhood will be the ones to benefit from the park.

'Null and void'

Julian Delangie, a housing and civil law lawyer representing the two artists, is waiting for their next day in court. The housing tribunal hearing date was postponed in February. He says the pair have a strong case against eviction.

"They have the same grounds to oppose their eviction with the exception that Goring is protected by article 1959.1 of the Civil Code, which in these circumstances makes it impossible for the landlord to evict him," he said.

Goring meets the standard for protection because he is over 70, on limited income and has been living in the building for more than 10 years.

According to Delangie, the eviction notice did not specify the landlord's plans for the space. That information, along with permits from the city requesting permission for the changes, are required to convince the tribunal that he can carry out the projects. Without them, Delangie says, the evictions are null and void.

The landlord, Sheldon Mintzberg, has not responded to CBC's request for comment.

In a statement, the borough of Rosemont–La Petite-Patrie confirmed that Mintzberg has not filed the permit applications for the two units in the past year.

A community lost

At a Rosemont–La Petite-Patrie municipal council meeting on Monday, Foster got up to address the mayor, the councillors and the crowd in attendance.

After hearing that a private company, Premium Barrel Consultancies, was planning on renting space in the building to house a whisky distillery, the Friends of Gorilla Park were up in arms.

"We've lived through the covid pandemic. Now it's the eviction pandemic. It's everywhere. It's not just me," she said.

Foster pleaded with the council to find a solution to keep her in her home.

"My dream is to continue in my community … I'm not finished doing what my mission is in this life."

Borough mayor François Limoges answered the plea by saying it would be "infinitely cruel" to inaugurate Gorilla Park without Foster, but that the municipality had no power over her eviction or the management of residential and commercial leases.

Limoges also said the part of the building the distillery was planning to acquire is on the other side of the property and in no way related to the units inhabited by the remaining artists.

Virginie Gauvin is Foster's neighbour and a member of Friends of Gorilla Park. She came to show her support, and said she isn't satisfied with the mayor's response.

"If we want citizen mobilization, we have to make sure that the people who gave their time can stay or people who get involved anymore," she said.

"It's not the rich who move there that will give their time for the community. It's the artists who reimagine the neighbourhood, and who are ejected the moment the work is done."

She says she wants to see the borough be more proactive in negotiating with developers so that artists won't have to face eviction year after year.

Another fellow Gorilla member, Julie Patenaude, was also in attendance.

"[The eviction] speaks volumes about how the system doesn't work," she said. "We've lost so many artists," she said. "There's no social housing or affordable housing in the neighbourhood."

Matt MacMillan, the man behind Premium Barrel Consultancies distillery, also made an appearance. He says he didn't know that there were people living in the building until a few months ago when he found out about them on social media.

Although he says the distillery project has no bearing on artists' evictions, he wanted to come and speak with Frances and let her know he wasn't the one evicting her.

He says he will take her up on her invitation to have a cup of coffee at her home and hopes she and the landlord can find a solution to keep her in the community that means so much to her.