Montreal food bank and 12 other community organizations face eviction from CSSDM building

A Montreal food bank known as Le SNAC and 12 other community groups located in a building in Ahuntsic are facing eviction as of December 27th once their lease expires.

This means that food given to the neighbourhood’s most vulnerable people at this location and two other distribution points in the area could be disrupted for several weeks. 

“Before the pandemic, it was like a thousand families who come here, the different families. And now, you know, it’s close to two thousand. So if we close, all these people won’t have help,” said Chantal Comtois, the director general of Service de Nutrition et d’Action Communautaire (SNAC).

Mario Morice, an Ahuntsic resident and volunteer for Le SNAC adds, “We’ll be lacking in food, certainly. A lot of the things we cook from day to day, they come from here. And I think, like my family, a lot of people, they rely on these places to, you know, exist.”

“I’m appalled, didn’t know this would happen. And me and my family have been using this for about five years,” Morice continued.

Jöelle, another Ahuntsic resident says, “I do it for four families, so I will have to either, since I don’t have a car, it’s going to be harder for me to go somewhere else to get the food for them.”

The 13 organizations in the building are referred to as Solidarité Ahuntsic. They offer services to the community that often complement each other, so an eviction would likely mean displacing these groups into separate locations. 

“They help everybody. We have a kindergarten, we have food, we have food, we have clothes, we have toys, everything over here,” said Nery Gonzalez, an Ahuntsic resident.

Sandra, another Ahuntsic resident says, “I can do activities with my children, then go get food. If everyone moves, because it will affect several organizations, I will have to go here and there, and I don’t know how long it will last, so I would like it to stay there.”

Rémy Robitaille, the director of Solidarité Ahuntsic says, “usually, we serve around 25,000 persons a year with the 13 organizations, so those persons will have to find other ways to find help.”

The building is owned by the CSSDM, the Montreal school service centre. In a written response to CityNews, they say that they need the building for francization programs because another CSSDM building, Complexe William-Hingston, that has served as their francization centre is undergoing renovations.

The CSSDM also says that Solidarité Ahuntsic repeatedly refused to regularize and sign a lease since 2018, so they have only been bound by a 30-day lease. They add that there has been a rent freeze on the building for the past six years.

“We even told them that we could pay more for the rent and they refused it. They want us to leave,” said Robitaille. 

Solidarité Ahuntsic would now like to meet with the Quebec government to see if they will allow them to stay in the building in the coming years rather than being forced to leave in the coming days. 

“What I want is that the ministries, they can speak with us, that we can make an arrangement, that it will be win-win to everybody,” said Comtois.

Robitaille adds, “I’m asking to the ministries so that they have to help us to find a way to solve the situation, but I already sent many emails to them and they never replied to them.”