City hall announced this week how it’s distributing $50 million over two years toward easing the homelessness crisis. This was money already promised in the budget.
Reading this piece, my cynicism kicks in. People will be hired and paid and every so often announcements will be made to the press, but two years from now, there will be more tents along Notre‑Dame East than there are today. Anyone want to bet?
Three men have been arrested and will be charged with murder in the first degree in connection with a fatal shooting at a St‑Léonard car wash in April 2022. As reported at the time.
Christopher Curtis looks into who raises money for Ensemble and his observations are a must‑read.
Excellent work, as always. Canada’s COI laws are a joke to begin with, but at the municipal level it’s evident they wouldn’t even matter.
*conflict of interest
This is so frustrating. Municipal (and I believe provincial) donations are capped at 100$ which is a really nice way of limiting any given person’s influence. It’s one of those laws that makes me super happy to be a Quebecker. But if people can just get registered as solicitors and package donations together, getting credit for the whole amount, that just undoes the whole point of capping donations. Most aggravating thing I’ve learned today.
A woman pedestrian was hit by a car in Longue‑Pointe on May 20 and died two days later. It was only reported on Tuesday.
Another fatal accident occurred in Mercier on Wednesday morning when two cars collided, leaving someone dead in one of the vehicles.
Later, TVA says the man who died in this second item had just stolen the car. Doesn’t sound like it was a police chase, though.
Steven Guilbeault is to announce that he will be leaving politics this summer, having parted ways ethically with the Carney government over plans to build a new oil pipeline.
Guilbeault has been MP for Laurier–Sainte‑Marie since 2019.
I’ll always remember him as the heritage minister who decided it wasn’t a good idea to list the names of suspected Nazi war criminals and collaborators on Ottawa’s Victims of Communism monument, after Canadian Heritage decided to go ahead with the plan despite the historians they hired not having fully vetted the list.
As noted below in a comment by DeWolf, St‑Denis won’t be pedestrianized in the Quartier Latin as usual this summer, although there will be a couple of temporary street events. Some merchants are not happy, because they’ve benefited from the vibe of a strolling street.
It won’t be pedestrianized next summer either.
There’s a fun twist: merchants unhappy because their streets aren’t being pedestrianized?
I’ll bet my left arm a number of merchants voted against Project Montreal, who played a key role in the summer pedestrianization of Quartier Latin. The city had partnered with the SDC Quartier Latin and local merchants to launch an economic recovery plan that included seasonal pedestrian-only zones. Hope they’re crying tears of regret.
The merchants on that stretch had one of of heir own running with Craig Sauve (Sergio da Silva, operator of Turbo Haus and Le café Big Trouble, not your typical ‘merchant’ to say the least). Probably the only SDC where votes against Project were steering further left.
CF Montreal had hopes of being able to play winter matches in the refurbished Olympic stadium, but when and whether this will ever be possible is still uncertain.
On the one hand, the new MLS schedule means the CF needs an indoor stadium (way more winter games). On the other hand, Quebecers should be fully on the hook to enable the Saputos to have a leisure project.
I’ve been on the pitch for soccer matches below freezing. Not too fun, but I wasn’t being paid what these guys are making. The Als can do it in November, the NFL does it in January, maybe they can handle a game or two in November (and, as they said, go on the road a bit). Baseball rains out, they can figure it out if we get a blizzard.
Did you mean “should NOT be”, Joey?
I thought he was being satirical…
LOL let’s say you’re both right
Anyway, MLS is moving its calendar because, presumably, it will generate more profit for the league and its teams. So let them pick up at least part of the tab…
Nicholas: I think the concern is more for the fans than the players.
Joey: MLS is moving its calendar to be in sync with the global soccer calendar. As it stands, MLS plays through several international breaks where all of the other significant leagues shut down to release players to their national teams. (A side effect of having run on a different calendar than all the other leagues for all these years is that it’s been a contributing factor to many elite players taking a pass on MLS.)
And MLS is not going to pick up part of the tab here. They are an American-based league who just so happen to have a handful of Canadian teams in it. I think they’d be just as happy if Montreal and Vancouver were replaced with Detroit and Las Vegas. (It’s a problem generally for Canadian sport that our top level teams in most sports are mixed up with these American concerns.)
Yeah, I understand the rationale behind the calendar change (which makes sense IMO), but it’s undeniable that MLS wouldn’t be making this move if it didn’t think it could make more money as a result – as you point out, they would trade off Mtl and Vancouver for US-based teams if they could make more money. But the way CF Mtl is positioning this is that the MLS is doing some altruistic schedule change to appease more important leagues and don’t-ya-know they just don’t have the money to support their franchises who are not set up for a winter season. Granted, it’s ridiculous to spend what $800M+ to renovate the stadium and *not* have it be able to host the local soccer franchise, but it can’t just be a permanent, recurring handout to the Saputos (net worth estimated at $7.59 billion by Maclean’s).
Josh, the CFL playoffs are mostly all outdoors, and sometimes it’s actively snowing and the stands seem pretty full. The Bills have had a few games with two feet of snow in the last few years, one which resulted in a one-day delay. If Montreal fans can’t handle being outside for two hours in November weather we may as well just pack the team in now.
The CFL playoffs end in November. Nobody is going to watch soccer outdoors in Montreal in February. No MLS team is going to agree to play soccer outdoors in Montreal in February.
A pro-Palestine rally on the weekend is being investigated over mock hangings apparently of Donald Trump, Benjamin Netanyahu and Israeli politician Itamar Ben-Gvir.
There are now 95 tents along the Notre‑Dame East park strip, a record number.
A recent report from the Observatoire Grand Montréal says the city population is in decline as the population ages and immigration is curtailed.
More on this Tuesday: it’s not just that the population will shrink, but that it will also age, putting more of a burden on its younger, working‑age people.
Charles Milliard wants Quebec to emulate Doug Ford’s Ontario. Enough said?
Charles Milliard: how else can I prove to you I have no idea what I’m doing right now?
Politics must be a lot harder than it looks given how often seemingly intelligent people wind up saying stuff like this…
Well, I only scanned the article but it seems like he’s mostly referring to things like making inter-provincial trade easier, standing up to Trump, and saying yes to Federal assistance in industry development. I’m not going to complain about those things.
Isn’t that the point? The hard part of doing politics is being able to say “we should borrow ideas and approaches from Doug Ford’s government” without everyone hearing “I want Quebec to emulate Doug Ford’s Ontario”… easier said than done…
Writing headlines – like writing brief blog summaries – lends itself to oversimplification.
I dunno… ‘breaking down interprovincial trade barriers’ is a fancy way of saying ‘restricting workers’ rights’, and workers’ don’t have many rights to begin with, even here. It’s a euphemism for ‘get rid of anything standing in the way of the corporate steamroller.’
Ford has taken a hatchet to Ontario’s environmental regulations, is a big fossil fuel booster, rejects EVs for purely ideological reasons, has zero respect for the press or for the rights of cities, and is pushing for nuclear power, despite far cheaper and more effective alternatives.
He’s a rightwing populist, fundamentally no different than Danielle Smith, Scott Moe, or Pierre Poilievre. They are all cut from the same cloth, and they all will say and do whatever a small minority of elites tell them to, using language designed to appeal to everyone’s basest instincts.
Do we need more of that in Quebec?
“‘breaking down interprovincial trade barriers’ is a fancy way of saying ‘restricting workers’ rights’, and workers’ don’t have many rights to begin with, even here. It’s a euphemism for ‘get rid of anything standing in the way of the corporate steamroller.’”
Well, no, it’s more like “why was it so easy to sell goods to the U.S. but not right across the provincial border? Now that the U.S. is being the way they are it makes sense to do more trade horizontally.
Most of those interprovincial trade barriers are based on things like the big domestic breweries needing to have a footprint in each province for union reasons, or to protect some agricultural producers, but that’s very 1950s thinking. It makes it difficult (for example) for a small independent brewery in Quebec to sell into Ontario or other provinces, or for Quebec cheese makers to sell to other provinces.
…it makes no sense that in Ontario you can find tons and tons of U.S. products, but so much stuff trying to come in from Quebec or BC has barriers on it.
I agree with Blork, including about how the headline is about emulating Ford but the article is about a speech to Toronto business people talking about how much he likes Ontario business. And while he could go into Ontario and say “I think the person I hope to be working with for 3 years sucks,” you can see why he might not do that.
Every story about inter-provincial trade I’ve ever read features some craft brewer going on about how they can’t sell their beer in Alberta or whatever. If only we got rid of these silly laws, the economy could benefit by (X) billions of dollars.
Now, I’m no economist, but I do enjoy the occasional micro-brew. There’s some from my last trip to Ontario in my fridge even now. Thing is, if it becomes legal to sell BC beer here or whatever, that’s nice, but not I’m going to drink much more of it. Whatever I buy from BC will replace what I now buy from Quebec. So, unless I and many others turn into a raging alcoholic (consuming only expensive niche products, mind you), I don’t see where these billions of dollars will come from.
All of which is to say that, yeah, I agree with Taylor that I suspect inter-provincial trade barriers is code for “race to the bottom of worker, consumer and environmental protections.”
The microbrewery example is always brought up because it’s easy to remember. It’s actually more about aligning various regulations and standards, etc. A bad (and fictional) example is something like this: Ontario insists that eggs be packaged by the tens while Quebec insists that eggs be packaged by the dozen. So Quebec farmers can’t sell eggs into Ontario unless they go through the expensive process of adding a “by the tens” packaging line. Obviously that’s made up, but my understanding is there are many real-life examples like that.
From a report last year by the Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives:
“The idea that there are vast, hidden interprovincial trade barriers holding back the Canadian economy has seized the political, media and public imagination. In reality, the alleged costs of interprovincial trade irritants have been vastly overstated, as virtually all goods, services and investment flows freely across provincial borders. In that sense, recent laws and executive decisions aimed at increasing internal trade should be seen as the “premiers’ new clothes.” […] While these efforts will have little effect on Canada’s internal economy, there are downsides to the public interest [as they] will further reduce governments’ capacity to protect the environment, spur domestic economies, promote workplace health and safety, and stop predatory behaviours against consumers.”
Lots of good examples and analysis in the report.
The Permanent People’s Tribunal has opened a week‑long investigation here into missing Indigenous children and unmarked burials. But as noted in the Radio‑Canada deck, the tribunal’s rulings are not legally binding. A full ruling is expected at the end of September.
The city’s official list of pedestrianized streets for summer 2026.
Here’s a version from CTV with a grille, but no map. Item from La Presse, but still no map.
Isn’t St-Paul Street usually pedestrianized? But it never seems to be listed.
Some media note that rue Villeray is a new one, but it’s only being pedestrianized as an alternative to de Castelnau, part of which had been closed to traffic for several summers but which needs to be dug up this year.
Before I make one, I wonder if there’s a visual map of these locations.
Looking, but haven’t seen one.
The Gazette has one here:
https://montrealgazette.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2026/05/pedestrianized-streets-2026.svg
Was just about to post that, LJ. Thanks!
@Mozai The Gazette has one here: https://montrealgazette.com/news/car-free-pedestrianized-streets-montreal-summer/. There also a shapefile you can download to make your own: https://donnees.montreal.ca/dataset/rues-pietonnes/resource/425d94e5-19e9-450a-89ef-4548ed409dcd.
St-Paul is already pedestrianized from Marché Bonsecours until St-Laurent and essentially becomes a shared street until McGill. You could also add place Jacques-Cartier which, for some inexplicable reason, is open to cars throughout the winter. I also noticed signs saying that Place d’Youville is going to be closed to cars over the summer.
Mont-Royal has been blocked off and they’re setting up. My favourite though is Duluth. Why the city allows cars on that street most of the year makes no sense to me!
I guess St-Denis in the Latin Quarter isn’t being pedestrianized this year?
@CE — Sadly the Latin Quarter won’t be pedestrianized for the next two or three years due to the construction on Berri. The rationale is that St-Denis is needed for emergency access to the CHUM now that Berri is completely blocked. I think that also means the circus festival and other events held on the pedestrian strip will be displaced. The city gave the SDC a bunch of money this year so maybe there will be some interesting public terrasses or other installations.
These annual media reports never seem to include St-Paul, for some reason, even though the SMF administration cancelled plans to keep it pedestrianized year-round, so it’s definitely one of the summertime-only pedestrian streets.
There’s also Ste-Catherine in the Quartier des spectacles but thankfully that was permanently pedestrianized before SMF came into power. It had been “temporarily” pedestrianized year-round since 2020.
La Presse has a short photo essay around the 150th anniversary of Mount Royal Park.
Serge Audette was found guilty Monday of a murder committed 30 years ago, when he killed his neighbour Patricia Ferguson in Pointe‑aux‑Trembles.
Updating to add Daniel Renaud’s interview with Sabrina Ferguson.
A great example of how effective and powerful good journalism/filmmaking can be. According to the article, the doc raised the question of how a violent sex offender was the last person to see Ferguson alive (and how the police didn’t look into him properly?). Ferguson also had an 11 mo girl at the time and her daughter always thought she had been abandoned. Now she knows the truth.
Good point, Meezly. It must be so strange for her daughter, who wouldn’t even remember her mother yet could have been haunted by the thought she might have been abandoned. It is better to know.
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