2023-06-14 22:52:08
Camping in the woods, under a tent: this is the solution taken by a 74-year-old man in Trois-Rivières, for lack of available accommodation.
Richard Dufault visited regarding fifteen homes, without ever succeeding in obtaining a rental.
“I may meet several owners, they take my contact details, but they don’t call me back. I call back, they tell me it’s rented.
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While waiting to find housing at a price that suits him, he has settled in a wooded area, on land that does not belong to him.
Trois-Rivières has one of the lowest rental vacancy rates in Quebec, with 0.9 per cent. For the market to be considered balanced, the Canada Mortgage and Housing Corporation has indicated that the vacancy rate must be around 3%.
InfoLogis Mauricie has noticed discrimination once morest seniors, but also once morest single-parent women and newcomers looking for housing.
According to the coordinator of the organization Claude Jalette, Richard Dufault is not the only one to settle in an improvised camp in Trois-Rivières. “We no longer have the same profiles of people looking for housing or who find themselves homeless. It is very worrying.”
The waiting list for the Office municipal d’habitation de Trois-Rivières is longer than ever: 500 people are waiting for housing that meets their ability to pay.
“On July 1, we anticipate nearly 70 households who will no longer have housing, who will have no place to go,” said Marie-Ève Croteau, communications advisor at the Municipal Housing Office of Three-Rivers.
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She added that half of these households have the option of staying with relatives.
The Housing Search Assistance Service team, which has been in existence for a year in Trois-Rivières, is committed to finding temporary solutions so that no one is left homeless.
If no alternative is found, the City of Trois-Rivières will provide emergency accommodation. As for improvised camps, the Trois-Rivières police say they tolerate them as long as there is no there are no complaints from citizens. Richard Dufault hopes to spend as few nights as possible in his tent.
“I give myself until the end of the month, then if I don’t find anything, I go back to Peru.”
Screenshot | VAT News
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