Homeless in Montreal: New 5-year plan aims to get 2,000 off streets

The City of Montreal is moving forward with a plan first announced by the mayor in 2014 to create a new full-time advocate for the homeless. 

Denis Coderre said that "protector" will work on the ground with people living on the streets, to ensure services are available to them and their rights are respected.

The protector will be a "link between the homeless and the system," said Coderre. "It's how can we reconcile and bring back dignity between society and [homeless people]."

"I think that healing process starts with outreach."

Should not be a lifestyle 

The creation of that position is a key element in a $36.9 million, five-year plan released Friday that will focus on the "chronically and cyclically" homeless, said Matthew Pierce, the executive director of the Old Brewery Mission. 

That refers to people who have been living on the street for at least three years or who find themselves without a roof over their head time and again.

"What we don't want it to do is see [homelessness] become a lifestyle... which is what it's become for the chronic population," said Pierce.  "So we're focusing on that population, which is currently blocking up the system."

Pressure on emergency services

The Movement to End Homeless in Montreal (MMFIM) - a coalition that includes the City of Montreal, police and shelters - said the aim of the new plan is to get 2,000 people off the streets and into more stable housing.

That would free up emergency services, including ambulances, hospitals, shelters and transitional housing.

Among the measures:

• The establishment of three new intake centres.
• The hiring of 30 new case workers.
• Work to bring affordable and subsidized housing within reach for more homeless people.

"It's quite doable in the next five years," said MMFIM general manager James McGregor. "A lot of the pieces are there. What we need to do is pull them together in a plan."

The City of Montreal will contribute $140,000 a year for five years towards the plan.

I Count MTL

The MMFIM's 2,000-person target comes from the I Count MTL survey conducted last March.

Eight hundred volunteers spread out throughout the city one night, counting 3,016 homeless people.

They say of about two-thirds of those counted are chronically or cyclically homeless - and in pressing need of help.

The plan released Friday is the first of three parts being prepared by the MMFIM.

The coalition will roll out a plan to address situational homelessness - people experiencing homelessness for the first time - in 2016.