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allison hanes: welcome hall mission celebrates the rapid rehousing of 400 montrealers
there are "some incredible stories" among the people who have been helped in the program, says director sam watts before an event bringing together some of those who have made the initiative possible.
jul 26 2024
4 minute read
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sékou doumbouya arrived in montreal last october with a pair of crutches and a heart full of dreams.
but the 25-year-old amputee from guinea soon discovered it was harder to find a job with his handicap than he expected.
by february, he found himself homeless, bouncing from shelter to shelter during his first montreal winter.
“it was very hard on crutches,” doumbouya remembered. “i even fell on the stairs in the métro.”
things turned around late in the spring when he was put in touch with the welcome hall mission and assessed as a candidate for its rapid-rehousing program. on july 1, he moved into his own apartment in the city’s east end. welcome hall offered some furniture, help with food, four months’ worth of rent and a fresh start for doumbouya, who wants to return to school and work in information technology some day.
“it’s a new beginning for me,” he said in an interview.
his story is also part of a major milestone for the welcome hall mission. the non-profit organization, which has served the city’s disadvantaged since 1892, recently found a permanent home for its 400th montrealer through a program it developed in the throes of the pandemic.
sam watts, the president and ceo of welcome hall, recalled that tumultuous time. the city was grappling with a homeless encampment on notre dame st. e. and the community group was operating a night-time emergency shelter in the hôtel place dupuis that had to be evacuated and thoroughly disinfected every morning.
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“the idea came to us that a lot of these people could be easily housed if we could just find a place for them. so we started a conversation with one person who stands out in my mind at the ciusss centre-sud and we began to do a bunch of ‘what ifs,'” watts said. “they had an extra, about a million dollars, in their envelope, from the federal government … and they said to us, ‘what could you guys do if we could do something with this million bucks?’”
welcome hall proposed targeting some of the less complex cases among the growing ranks of montrealers experiencing homelessness.
“the idea was you find people who have had a bad few months, who have some revenue, and you give them a move-in kit, you find them the right place in the right location, and you pay four months of their rent. and then you follow up and give them a bunch of stuff,” watts explained. “so we started doing that, and guess what? we house 100 people. in the first wave, i think it was 73 that we got in… we thought this was one-time-only, we’re never going to see this money again, let’s just see how many we can do. it’s been renewed eight times now, every time for a little bit more and a little bit more. and so now we last week housed the 400th person.”
welcome hall will host an event friday to celebrate this accomplishment and bring together some of those who have made the initiative possible.
lionel carmant, quebec’s minister of social services, has been a champion of the program, writes allison hanes.
graham hughes
/
the canadian press
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lionel carmant, quebec’s minister of social services, has been a champion, ensuring that every time the budget ran out, more money was found to continue.
also invited are some of the landlords who have rented out apartments. the vast majority of the 400 clients have been rehoused in private dwellings.
feriel manaï manages several buildings in the plateau mont-royal and has accepted eight residents referred by welcome hall in the past two years.
it’s a low-risk undertaking, she said, since the new tenants have four months of rent covered and get other social supports. plus the organization calls every month to see how things are going.
“these are human beings like everyone else. it’s not because someone who has spent time on the streets that they can’t reintegrate,” manaï added. “it could happen to anyone.”
welcome hall’s rapid-rehousing program is a notable success story at a challenging time in montreal. the crisis in the affordability and availability of housing is affecting more and more people, while the worsening scourges of addiction and mental-health issues are undermining the public’s sense of security. although it wouldn’t necessarily address some of the more complex and chronic cases of homelessness, the initiative is especially effective in reversing the fortunes and easing the trauma of the newly unhoused.
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“when we see somebody coming into our place for the first time — any one of our emergency services — we’re on top of that, trying to figure out, ‘is this somebody who has just fallen into our orbit that we can get out of our orbit as soon as possible?’” watts said. “we’ve had situations where we can get somebody back into permanent housing inside a week.”
about 85 per cent of the 400 clients who have been rehoused remain in their new domiciles. the cost of about $10,000 per person is a sound investment compared with the tab for law enforcement or emergency care when someone is left on the streets.
there are “some incredible stories” among the 400 montrealers who have been helped back to housing, watts said, including a man who was living in a tent under the metropolitain expressway who now rents an apartment overlooking the spot where he used to camp.
“it’s really the speed and the targeting that is just so important,” watts said. “if you can get somebody into four walls and a roof and make sure that they have a community of support … then amazing things can happen.”
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