In a spectacularly secular decree, Premier Legault announced this evening that gatherings in homes and restaurants will be limited to six people as of Dec. 26.
Updates from December, 2021 Toggle Comment Threads | Keyboard Shortcuts
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Kate
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Kate
The city budget for 2022 is out, and involves an average 2% tax hike. There will be more money for the homeless, for bike paths, for public transit – but the biggest boost will be for the SPVM.
STM services are going to be cut, -3.5% for the bus, -2% for the metro, to save money. Usage is undeniably down.
Of course Arif Salem is not happy – but then why would they be? It’s just more empty posturing from Ensemble.
DeWolf
Ensemble’s position is that they are very upset the city has no money, and they’re also very upset the city is not spending more to support everyone during the fifth wave.
¯\_(ツ)_/¯
ant6n
They’re probably also upset about high taxes.
steph
All year we’ve been hearing about property valies going up ~10% in value. Should’t property taxes follow these higher evaluations?
Ian
Not unless you want everyone’s rent going up 10%.
steph
It’s not a question of “wanting”, but don’t property assessors explicitly do this sort of thing? I assumed they didn’t change the tax rate, they just jacked up home values while innocently smiling “we’re not increasing taxes”. This is how my grandmother ona fixed income got pushed out of her homes, There’s nothing glorious about the system.
ant6n
Can’t elderly ppl use a home equity line of credit to pay the higher real estate taxes? Like, when one dies, does it matter if the bank owns 20% of the house at that point?
Tim
Montreal uses an averaging calculation over a total of 3 years to determine the value of a property when it is calculating taxes. In the years that I have been paying property taxes, it has appeared to smooth things out over time.
It seems like seniors in Montreal cannot defer property taxes (which they can do in some places like Vancouver) but there is a grant in place to offset property tax increases if the family income is $53,300 or less (https://www.revenuquebec.ca/en/citizens/tax-credits/grant-for-seniors-to-offset-a-municipal-tax-increase/).
Property taxes appear to be about 1% of a home’s assessed value. A HELOC could easily be arranged to cover these taxes and it would take almost 20 years of borrowing to get to the 20% example from @ant6n.
Affluent seniors who own their own houses have a wide array of options to choose from. And if Valerie Plante follows through on her election promise, they’ll be able to ride the metro for free for the rest of their lives.
Jeff
One time I called the police to tell them about a native canadian woman I thought was being trafficked, and nobody would hear it. Shouldn’t we be exploring alternatives to police, instead of raising taxes to pay even more for their services?
SMD
Mayor Plante announced during the campaign that she would freeze the tax increases due to rising property values for seniors on fixed income, and only have them pay the cumulative value when their house was sold. It will be interesting to follow this promise and see if she follows through on it.
ant6n
That would mean the city giving the HELOC instead of the bank.
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Kate
We broke an arbitrary number Wednesday as the cumulative total of Quebecers who’ve been diagnosed with Covid since the start of the pandemic passed half a million. But we also saw a record 6361 new cases over the last 24 hours.
The Journal notes the return of waiting lines to get into stores. The Gazette predicts that Quebec is going to impose a new curfew, limit gatherings to six, and decree a two-week shutdown on nonessential businesses. But we’ll know at 6 pm.
Blork
I went to the SAQ yesterday, and they had put the sign back up saying “limit 29 clients at a time.” I was also shocked at how bare the shelves were; a couple of weeks ago when others were complaining about shortages due to the distribution strike, my local SAQ was normally stocked. But yesterday about 75% of the shelves were empty! I thought maybe there was a run on booze before a lockdown, but then I saw a pattern; some item were fully stocked and some completely empty. I assume if it was a run on booze people wouldn’t be very discriminating.
It hit the grocery store this morning for what will hopefully be the last time before the new year (notwithstanding a dep run or two). I did not see any signs limiting access, and there were no lineups, but then it was 9:15AM. Pretty busy inside though.
DeWolf
La Presse reported this morning that a curfew had been considered but is now off the table. We’ll see whose sources are more reliable.
I think at this point, a short but sharp lockdown would do nothing but good, but a curfew is abusive and ineffective. It didn’t work last year and we had it for five months. Why would it work this time around?
Matthew H
It is mind-boggling that anyone can think the curfew was ineffective. Go to the CBC Coronavirus Tracker site, switch the timespan to “All Time”, and toggle between Quebec and Ontario (or any other large province). Look at the difference in the height of the third wave from Jan–May 2021!
DeWolf
The overall trend between the two provinces is nearly identical, especially in the two months after the curfew was first imposed. The main difference is that Ontario had a higher peak during the third wave. Why would the curfew have suddenly made a difference in April but not in January, February or March?
If you’ll recall, plenty of regions in Quebec had big outbreaks during the spring, despite the curfew. But the province’s overall trend was influenced by Montreal, which kept cases relatively low because of good contact tracing and targeted vaccinations:
walkerp
The curfew was great for the environment and air and noise pollution in Montreal. Bring it on.
Raymond Lutz
We need that same covid19 lock-down 5% degrowth year after year after year to stay in line with the Paris agreement (ie stay under +2C) Jancovici, en français.
Max
The Gazoo says Quebec’s going to announce *9,000* new cases tomorrow.
We’re in for a real shit show these next few weeks. Merry Christmas everybody.
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Kate
As everything else goes to hell, the weather service is predicting a perfect Christmas, “one with at least two centimetres of snow on the ground plus snow falling from the sky on Christmas Day.”
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Kate
It used to be the glowing tree at Place Ville‑Marie that meant Christmastime was here, but now it’s the decorations that appear mysteriously around the pink house atop the old Canada Malting. Photo kyped from Facebook.
ant6n
“kyped”? Must be Star wars terminology or something…
Ian
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Kate
Sorry to go all Covid all the time, but there’s not much other news.
Omicron now counts for 80% of diagnosed cases in Quebec, and we’re expecting to see 6000 new cases in Wednesday’s tally.
François Legault will give a presser on Wednesday at 6 pm to announce Quebec’s “very difficult choices” as Covid cases fill up hospital beds.
The Gazette has advice on not getting freaked out.
GC
We know you don’t *make* the news. It’s frustrating–and feeling like a flashback to spring 2020–but we understand.
EmilyG
One of the items in the Gazette article on how to deal with Covid stress, says to get enough sleep.
I have sleeping problems that I can’t see a specialist about because of rampant Covid everywhere.
My, my.Kate
EmilyG, have you tried CBD? You can get CBD oil capsules at the SQDC. They don’t make you high but they might smooth things out and make sleep easier.
EmilyG
I don’t think CBD works with possible sleep apnea, and weed smoke makes my heartbeat even more irregular than usual, so I’d be hesitant to try CBD, but thanks for the suggestion.
Joey
@EmilyG surprised you can’t do a home sleep test + telemedicine with a respiratory specialist to get your apnea diagnosed and CPAP machine prescribed (though I have no idea whether there are any CPAP machines to acquire given the Phillips recall from earlier this year). Try contacting Sleep Medica?
EmilyG
Yes, I do have a referral for a home sleep test. I haven’t yet contacted the sleep clinic because I don’t feel that comfortable going places until at least the antibodies from my booster shot kick in.
MarcG
You can buy CBD oil in an oral spray, so no need for smoking, and they typically provide a very low dose per activation so it’s easy to consume a very small amount if you just want to test it out.
MarcG
@EmilyG: Not suggesting you try it or that it would be helpful to your condition – just throwing some info out there.
dhomas
Plus one for CBD. My wife takes it as a tisane and swears by it. It won’t help for sleep apnea, though.
I used to work for a company that made sleep diagnostic systems. Home sleep diagnostic testing is a good indicator of sleep apnea, but it’s not conclusive. You need to get a full sleep diagnostic test (with electrodes on your scalp and all) to determine what kind of sleep apnea you have (Central, obstructive, mixed) and what treatment is best.
Chris 22:04 on 2021-12-22 Permalink
Christmas certainly was a Christian holiday. But do you honestly think it still is one? Perhaps the people I know are weird, but I don’t know a single person that goes to church on Chirstmas, but everyone I know either buys gifts, hangs with friends or family, or just generally enjoys some time off work. Nobody talks about Jesus or god, they all talk about shopping, partying, and family.
Seems quite a stretch to frame this as some kind for special treatment for Christians.
Ephraim 22:13 on 2021-12-22 Permalink
Yes, it’s a Christian holiday… plenty of people buy no gifts, don’t spend time with friends and family, etc. And I’m working on Christmas day… and it doesn’t bother me at all. I don’t think I have ever really received a Christmas gift in my life… because I’m NOT Christian.
Kevin 22:31 on 2021-12-22 Permalink
Go by any Catholic Church on Xmas Eve (maybe not this year since many have cancelled mass) and be astounded at how many people are there.
Kevin 22:32 on 2021-12-22 Permalink
And.. a 6 pm news conference for just that!?
The internal polling must have been terrible.
jeather 23:02 on 2021-12-22 Permalink
Yes, I hang with friends and family (as I do generally on holidays and weekends) because, well, what else am I supposed to do? Would I prefer to work Dec 25 and get a day off to use for my actual holidays, or have a longer shutdown period in a less expensive to travel (when that was a thing) time? Sure would. But I can’t.
Things that are culturally Christian are not secular, despite how many religious and cultural Christians seem to wish it were otherwise.
Related to polling: I would love to see how his popularity is.
Joey 23:23 on 2021-12-22 Permalink
If Saturday were the end of Ramadan or the first Seder, when would the six-person limit kick in?
Kate 01:11 on 2021-12-23 Permalink
Kevin, I know. I was expecting a real shutdown, serious measures, but it was just platitudes.
Joey: it would’ve been immediate, is what it would’ve been.
JoeNotCharles 11:38 on 2021-12-23 Permalink
There are two cultures that celebrate Christmas – Christians, and people whose culture doesn’t have any major winter celebration that fills a similar role to Christmas, so feel free to co-opt the originally Christian celebration.
That second group includes both people who were raised Christian but no longer believe, and people who were now raised to be secular, but earlier generations of their family were raised Christian. It probably includes some people from cultures that were never Christian, but don’t have any objection to Christmas, but I’d imagine those are vastly outnumbered by people who are from a formerly-Christian culture.
Notably it doesn’t include people who are from cultures that have their own things unrelated to Christianity. Which is the crux of the argument: “It’s ok to favour this because it’s no longer technically Christian” vs “It’s not ok to favour this because it doesn’t apply to everybody’s culture, whether it’s always religious or not doesn’t matter.”
Or, more broadly, “We only want people in this society who are just like us. Favouring things that don’t apply to everybody’s culture isn’t a bug, it’s a feature.”
qatzelok 13:59 on 2021-12-23 Permalink
The last two Xmases have felt more like Passovers in real time.
Kate 14:04 on 2021-12-23 Permalink
If only splashing some blood on the door would keep the plague away.
ant6n 17:03 on 2021-12-23 Permalink
Some “religious symbols” that Quebec laws try to eradicate are arguably culturally Muslim, etc.
I’d argue that Christmas isn’t necessarily religious, but it’s definitely culturally Christian. And the Quebec laws try to eradicate/reduce non-christian cultures, while subtly encouraging Christian culture.
(Don’t let me get started on language)