Volunteers help Pierrefonds-Roxboro residents hit hard by heavy rains

Elizabeth Cabildo was fast asleep when her basement apartment began to fill with water on Friday evening.

“My pillow dropped on the floor and then I picked it up and I just saw the water pouring on my face,” Cabildo recounted. “And ‘whoa, what happened?’ And I see the floor, the water is high.”

It was a rude awakening for the Pierrefonds-Roxboro resident, who now to deal with the significant damage and is lacking insurance coverage.

The remnants of tropical storm Debby dumped record-breaking amounts of rain on Quebec, with Laval and Pierrefonds-Roxboro among those hit hard.

“I went in the back room and there was water just coming through our walls,” said Pierrefonds resident Kelly Citrin. “And at that point I was trying to save it by putting pans and filling up buckets and buckets.

“All of a sudden it started coming from the floors. It started coming through the windows. It was pouring in like a waterfall. And when we looked outside, we couldn’t even get to the roads because it was just surrounded by water everywhere.”

Cabildo and Citrin were among those taking stock of the damages over the weekend.

In some cases, volunteers – mobilized by city councillor Benoit Langevin – stepped up to help those most in need. Volunteers helped some 30 households by Saturday morning, pulling out anything that accumulated moisture, like furniture, fabrics and mattresses, or water-damaged appliances.

“I’m so happy we have so many people around us to be able to help us because I don’t even know if we would be able to still do this to this day,” said resident Tessa Mendez Citrin, who was among those getting help from volunteers.

Langevin is inviting volunteers and residents in need to send an email to Benoit.Langevin@montreal.ca.

“It’s really a balance of how many people get involved versus how many requests I get,” Langevin said. “At this point, I’m on top.”

“I decided to email to see if we can get some support,” explained Citrin. “And they were at our house within a half hour, which was so amazing. And right now, they’re working so hard to bring up all our big appliances and fridges and cabinets and stuff. So I’m very thankful.”

Pierrefonds resident Chahi Tarakjian was among those lending a hand over the weekend.

“We’re community-oriented, we’re here to support and help people,” he said. “That’s being humane and just be there for people that are in need.”

“There’s the only way you can support them is really be there for them physically, give them a call. And from what I saw, it’s such a sad state, but I also look at the positive aspect of it, we’ll rebuild, reconstruct, and as long as everyone’s safe, which is the bottom line, that’s all that really matters because materials don’t.”

Langevin says part of helping residents also means learning about their stories, and sometimes the histories of their homes.

“I was at an address yesterday of an elder lady with her husband of over 90,” he said. “And you could see she was all happy to talk about some type of old tools, a 100-year-old tool that was there when they bought the house.

“All these stories that comes out of a basement is quite impressive.”