Municipal summit on homelessness: “I refuse to give up on people like Quebecers!”

The Municipal Summit on HomelessnessThe meeting, to be held in the capital on September 15, will be chaired by the mayor of Quebec, Bruno Marchand.

• Also Read: Homeless: Marchand criticized the government’s inability to move

Organized by the Union of Municipalities of Quebec (UMQ), the program addresses a growing problem in the province.

“This phenomenon is growing in cities where there are none [avait pas d’itinérance]Mayor Marchand said in an interview with TVA Novelles.

According to him, efforts should be made in cooperative work between various authorities.

“We can’t say it’s other people’s fault, but we need to work better with the government, CISSSs and CIUSSSs,” he said.

Mr Marchand said he was still awaiting figures for the fall of 2022.

“The minister assured that we will have them for the UMQ summit. If we don’t have numbers, we can go with intuition.

These are necessary to properly target needs and monitor the evolution of the situation after taking specific actions, he said.

According to the Quebec mayor, prevention has an important role to play in curbing the problem.

“We often hear that the homeless come from somewhere else,” he says.

In Vancouver,[des experts] Measured the travel of homeless people and found that more than 80% came from Vancouver and the region. It is not true that homelessness comes from somewhere else,” he continues.

Instead, “people in our community are vulnerable with housing issues, mental health issues and others”.

“Citizens are impatient, it is difficult to live with such situations”, laments Mr. Marchand.

“I refuse to give up like we Quebecers! This is unacceptable!” The mayor decided to stop the problem.

During his time in Finland, Bruno Marchand stated that there are solutions and that it is possible to restore the situation.

For example, it says that 20 years ago Finland struggled with 36,000 homeless people, compared to 3,500 today. The Scandinavian country hopes to reach net zero by 2027.

“We are no more stupid than the Finns!” He throws.

Watch the full interview in the video above.