Lack of affordable housing is driving poverty in Montreal, Centraide says

“I no longer say that we are in a housing crisis. We are in an endemic situation,” Claude Pinard says as his organization launches its 50th fundraising campaign.

Published Sep 20, 2023 • Last updated 3 hours ago • 3 minute read

A woman holds a sign prior to a march in Park Extension on June 22, 2023 calling on the Quebec government to cancel a plan to ban lease transfers. Photo by John Kenney /Montreal Gazette

Lack of affordable housing is the biggest reason poverty in Montreal has worsened over the past few years, according to the head of the city’s main philanthropic organization.

“Even if income has increased since 2018, the housing shortage and the unaffordability of housing are putting a lot of people in vulnerability positions who shouldn’t be there,” Claude Pinard, president of Centraide of Greater Montreal, said in an interview this week. “It’s as if there was a competition between essential needs. When you spend too much on rent, you don’t have much left to make it through the rest of the month, so you eat less and you don’t buy that new pair of pants that you need.

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“I no longer say that we are in a housing crisis. We are in an endemic situation.”

Pinard spoke as Centraide kicked off its 50th fundraising campaign, which will run until Dec. 31. He declined to provide a precise financial target for the drive, saying only that the organization wants to exceed last year’s $66-million tally.

About 800,000 people in Greater Montreal benefit from the help of the 375 community agencies that Centraide supports, which represents about one in five area residents. Around seven years ago, the proportion was one in seven, Pinard says.

Even though areas such as downtown have enjoyed a construction boom in the past five years — mostly centred on luxury condominiums — housing supply in Greater Montreal hasn’t kept pace with demand. For instance, multi-bedroom units with below-median rents are virtually unavailable to low-income families looking for adequate housing, according to a McKinsey report prepared for Centraide that was released in May.

Subsidized dwellings now account for 4.9 per cent of the housing stock in Montreal, the report shows. That’s short of the 6.9 per cent average for Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development member countries.

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Providing for all low-income households in Greater Montreal would require about 266,000 new subsidized housing units, the report says.

Problem is, Greater Montreal has only added about 1,400 social housing units a year since 1995. This means the region would need a 27-fold increase in the historical rate of subsidized housing construction to erase the shortfall by 2030, McKinsey calculated.

Government officials, developers, lenders and community groups must all be involved if Montreal is serious about closing the housing gap, Pinard says.

“Everybody must be at the table,” he said. “Nobody can solve any social issue on their own. It’s too complex. If we can sit people together, and if they leave their personal interests aside, we will have a chance. Collaboration is complex, but we don’t have any other choice. The government doesn’t have enough money to do it alone. The next few months are going to be interesting. It’s possible, but as a society we have to decide to do it.”

The way Pinard sees it, money alone won’t suffice.

“It’s an addition of solutions” that will be required to increase housing supply, he said. “Do we need to relax some municipal regulations? The answer is yes. Do we need to work on renovictions? Yes. Do we need to build new social and affordable housing units? Yes. Do we need to ensure the existing housing stock is in good shape? The answer is also yes. An investment fund that focuses on housing will not suffice. It will help, but we need a comprehensive response to the problem.”

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That broad effort begins with small steps. Centraide agreed last month to sell a Durocher St. parking lot, next to its Sherbrooke St. headquarters, to a Montreal developer called UTILE that plans to build affordable student residences on the property. Delivery is expected in 2027.

“We had this parking lot, which has been underused since the start of the pandemic because our employees have hybrid work schedules, so we decided to sell it,” Pinard said. “We got a fair market price for the asset and opened the door for a new project that will house students next to McGill.

“Our job here is to have an influence. We want people to realize that when we talk about housing, we’re not just talking about doors. We are talking about human beings. Right now, there are a lot of people who are being left behind and are in vulnerable positions because of housing.”

Donations to Centraide can be made at donate.centraide-mtl.org.

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