Projet Montréal has started a real revolution in housing over the past four years. We have finally provided the Ville de Montréal with a housing department. We have enhanced many assistance programs, particularly to promote access to home ownership, but also for home renovation. We implemented the strategy to develop 12,000 social and affordable housing units and exceeded our targets. We adopted the By-law for a diverse metropolis, which will ensure the construction of affordable and family housing in Montréal. And we set up the Réno logement abordable program in order to preserve the affordability of Montréal's rental inventory. Projet Montréal will continue these efforts in order to limit the overheating of the real estate market.
a. Launch a major operation of 60,000 long-term affordable housing units as quickly as possible, including 2,000 student housing units. How can we reach 60,000 affordable housing units?
- By using land already owned by the Ville de Montréal, such as the former hippodrome and Louvain Est, as well as surplus land belonging to the federal government, in collaboration with the CMHC;
- By acquiring new land thanks to the pre-emptive right, the By-law for a diverse metropolis and joint strategies with the SHDM;
- By reserving $800 million for the acquisition of this land, drawing inspiration from the land trust model;
- By guaranteeing the affordability of these homes for at least 40 years;
- By aligning our actions with the Government of Canada's funding programs and its National Housing Strategy to accelerate the selection of projects;
- By increasing the number of initiatives, such as the downtown “cellule facilitatrice” (facilitator unit), on a city-wide scale, in order to accelerate the development and construction of affordable housing;
- By encouraging smart densification on a human scale, including specific areas for affordable housing, in the new urban development and mobility plan.
b. Continue and facilitate the construction of social housing based on the availability of programs from the federal and provincial governments, and renew the Réflexe Montréal housing agreement, so that the budgets allocated annually allow for the construction of at least 2,000 AccèsLogis housing units per year in Montréal;
c. Support partners and align municipal subsidy programs for social and affordable housing with federal and provincial programs in order to facilitate the multi-party financing of housing projects in Montréal;
d. Pursue the strategy of acquiring land for social housing purposes, broadening the scope of the pre-emptive right, and allocating a $100 million budget to it over 10 years;
e. Call on the federal and provincial governments to provide urgent funding for the renovation of social housing offered by the Office municipal d'habitation de Montréal (OMHM) in order to quickly make unavailable housing available for rent and meet the needs of people with modest incomes;
f. Support the OMHM in the search for alternative financing to accelerate the renovation of its housing and leverage the current inventory;
g. Give the SHDM the means to develop more innovative housing projects in Montréal;
h. Increase the number of universally accessible housing units in social and community housing projects.
i. Continue and improve the support offered to first-time buyers;
j. Set up financial tools to allow the acquisition of affordable rental buildings by non-profits to create long-term housing and to get it out of real estate speculation, in particular by using the Ville de Montréal’s right of first refusal, subsidies, interest-free loans and patient capital, based on the experience acquired through the innovation associated with the 12,000 housing units strategy;
k. Establish municipal hygiene certification for rental housing and make it compulsory for obtaining any subsidy or financial support for renovation, and create a public rent and information register for tenants.