Activist Lucia Kowaluk dies
Longtime social activist Lucia Kowaluk has died. She was one of the key people who worked to save Milton Parc from clearcut redevelopment in the 1970s and was the partner of Dimitri Roussopoulos, who started Black Rose Books. She was also a Chevalière of the National Order of Quebec.
Michael Black 13:08 on 2019-02-03 Permalink
The Gazette article is kind of skimpy. I didn’t know about her homeless work, but I always knew that her name was attached to the time in the early seventies when La Cite came along, planning to tear down a lot more housing in the area, the fight limiting how big the complex became. But she was also involved in the Urban Ecology Centre, and I think the Strathearn Centre, which of course at some point was taken away and given to another group, and became the MAI.
Michael
Blork 13:42 on 2019-02-03 Permalink
My first address in Montreal was at the corner of Milton and Ste-Famille. While living there I read Claire Helman’s book “The Milton-Park Affair,” which is pretty much the best account of that whole La Cité story. It forever shaped my view of that neighbourhood, which is still sort of my “ground zero” for Montreal, and I go through there pretty regularly.
Side note: in the 90s I worked in the brown office building at 300 Léo-Pariseau (the one building in that complex that looks a bit different from the others). By then hardly anyone referred to the area as “Milton-Park.” The company I worked for had a second office in the UK, in Oxfordshire, in a business park called “Milton Park.” I was the only one who made the connection, and when I told the story of the Montreal Milton-Park situation they all just looked at me blankly, as if I was just telling them about a boring dream.
david100 14:57 on 2019-02-03 Permalink
I think in the end, Milton Park worked out great – we got the increased commercial and office space, along with thousands of apartments, but 90% of the neighborhood was saved. It’s taken a while to get there, the interchange had to come down, for instance, and there’s still a giant empty lot to be built out, along with problems like narrow sidewalks on Parc Ave. and the need for further renovations of the Cité complex to optimize the pedestrian experience, but overall the city is better for what got built and what didn’t. The one glaring failing is the new rez driveway – McGill should eliminate it, extend the building out to the street already.
Tee owe 15:18 on 2019-02-03 Permalink
I lived onJeanne Mance at Prince Arthur – somwhere around 1975 got served an eviction notice, from Concordia, dutifully showed up at Palais de Justice to contest it, there was a a lawyer in the room, wish I knew who, he collected all of us and had our cases thrown out, seemed like he was there just to do that. Can’t comment whether the city was improved by any of this but I was glad to be able to stay longer in a nice apartment.
Patrick 17:45 on 2019-02-03 Permalink
I’m sad to hear it. I worked with Lucia and Dimitri on Our Generation magazine many years ago, when the Milton Park movement was just getting going. I’ll never forget the way she could discuss the class struggle without missing a stitch as she knit through the meeting. She was indeed a very impressive person.