NBC Boston has a report on three families that visited Montreal at various points this year and had their vehicles stolen. They cite our cops as saying 8,237 vehicles have been reported stolen here from January through August.
Updates from October, 2023 Toggle Comment Threads | Keyboard Shortcuts
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Kate
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Kate
Costumes for a play at the Segal Centre were stolen days before opening night. CTV tells how the production mustered support to find replacements in time.
The sad thing is that whoever stole them probably ditched them after realizing they’d taken something of relatively little value outside their intended use.
Mizushōbai is the first stage production to have a cast of entirely Japanese-Canadian women.
Orr
Segal Centre theatre a real jewel, we should all go there more often.
We saw “English” there and it was amazing (not about us, btw) and several other pieces that were very good. Josephine: A Musical Cabaret also stands out.
Nice intimate theatre, love it.
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Kate
The city is tightening its belt to the tune of $100 million for the rest of the year given that costs are up and revenues are down. Notably, they’ve lost out on the charmingly named welcome tax, which comes into effect when houses are sold – except house sales are down because mortgage rates are up. The April ice storm and the summer downpours also bit into the budget.
jeather
Notably, not reducing police costs.
Ian
Well we’re going to have a big, big conversation about it someday.
Ephraim
I wonder how a city could save money, if only there were employees that we could ask about how to make the system more efficient.
One business made all its communications and forms efficient by a really simple change… the name of the person in charge of the form had to be listed on each form. Suddenly there were a lot less errors and a lot less duplication because people had someone to turn to when there was a problem… but also that person didn’t want to hear all the negative feedback about duplicated fields, questions that weren’t needed, etc. and magically the forms started to become more effective, because the feedback cut down on the duplication and work.
Mark Côté
Perhaps you know this, but the “welcome” tax was named after Jean Bienvenue, who was the Minister of Municipal Affairs when the tax came into being. It’s an entertaining double-entendre.
Daisy
Mark, it actually has nothing to do with Jean Bienvenue: https://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Taxe_de_bienvenue
Mark Côté
Huh, TIL! I got that info off of some random finance site.
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Kate
A week ago it was 29°.
Mozai
Looks like the past year stepped out-of-bounds above and below.
https://weatherspark.com/h/y/25077/2023/Historical-Weather-during-2023-in-Montr%C3%A9al-Canada#Figures-Temperature
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Kate
The “local” headlines floating to the top of my searches right now are this business news story: the Port of Montreal will get federal funds to build the mega‑terminal it has been dreaming of in Contrecœur, downriver.
The port itself claims to have put the project through a rigorous environmental assessment process but I think we all know what that means.
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Kate
A friend of Tony Accurso has saved his land for him which he’d otherwise have had to sell off to pay his creditors. Interestingly, one of his properties is the empty lot at St‑Laurent and René‑Lévesque which used to be used for parking. The city has right of refusal on that lot for social housing.
Tony Accurso is currently in prison.
DeWolf
Fun fact: whoever is “taking care” of the St-Laurent/René-Lévesque property is paying nearly $270,000 a year in taxes. That’s a lot of money for an empty lot.
Kate
When they were talking about running an elevated REM along René, that lot would’ve been taken over to build a station, I believe. I don’t know how Tony would’ve done out of the expropriation.
That lot has been used for a sort of outdoor seating area in summer, no? I haven’t been down there in so long.
DeWolf
It was from 2021-2022 but there was nothing this year. The space and art installations were organized by La Pépinière with funding from the city, but I guess the money dried up.
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Kate
The downtown YMCA building will soon be up for sale, the gym having never reopened since it was closed in March 2020.
Tofu va Vohu
Hm. I just took French lessons there all summer. There’s a lot of history visible, carved as memorials into the stone facing around the elevators. I think that it claims the building was originally built for the Sir George William College dating back to the 1920s.
Kate
Yes, that makes sense. Sir George Williams was the founder of the YMCA in England, and the college was a fork from the YMCA, originally intended as a college where working people could take evening classes.
Tee Owe
Thanks for the info on Sir George and YMCA – I never knew that!
JaneyB
That was a great YMCA. I was a member there for a few years. The Y does such important work, both gym and education. The mandate is so inclusive so you’d see all ages, sizes, and ability-levels. I don’t think there is any other kind of gym like the YMCAs.
James
My wife worked at the Y for many years in the child development sector. She worked like crazy trying to keep her programs afloat during the pandemic (staffing & child registrations). Ultimately it was for nothing because she was laid-off and the Y now seems to be emphasizing athletics. Unfortunately for them, there are other gyms that are cheaper.
The Y is in a death spiral. They have closed centres and sold off land to keep afloat – the downtown Y is just the latest one. The organisation is substantially smaller than it was in 2019. According to their annual report 2/3 of their revenue now comes from government grants.
Ephraim 07:21 on 2023-10-12 Permalink
And yet, they know the most stolen cars but can’t manage to put out a few bait cars, some apple tags, some boomerangs and curb the problem.
Kate 10:56 on 2023-10-12 Permalink
Don’t we have rules against entrapment?
Meezly 11:00 on 2023-10-12 Permalink
“The hotel staff was pretty matter-of-fact about the situation,” he said. “They said it’s probably on a ship already headed overseas.”
I thought that was pretty funny (though still sympathetic to their plight).
Ephraim 11:36 on 2023-10-12 Permalink
@Kate – That’s NOT entrapment. The car is sitting there. It’s the type of car they are looking for, but you have in no way made it easy, you just have set up to track it and for it to notify you immediately if it’s moving.
Entrapment would be sitting the car with the keys sitting in it, doors open.
The difference is this. Non-criminals would walk by the car and not even give it a second thought. It’s just a car. But thieves are looking for new Honda CR-Vs and Toyota RAV4s. It’s locked, they still have to unlock it and drive away. Nothing that the police did created the thought… I need to steal this. They don’t know who the criminal is, they didn’t set up the criminal to steal the car, they just set up the car to tell it when it was stolen so they could act. And a system to track the car, in real time.
See https://criminalnotebook.ca/index.php/Entrapment
Entrapment would be putting the car with the keys in front of the known criminal’s house, making it much too enticing for them to just walk on by.
Mark Côté 11:38 on 2023-10-12 Permalink
I’m sure H John can add a lot more, but entrapment is (quoting the wikipedia) “a practice in which a law enforcement agent or agent of the state induces a person to commit a ‘crime’ that the person would have otherwise been unlikely or unwilling to commit”. The article also states a Canadian precedent about “when the police go beyond merely providing an opportunity to commit an offence but actually induce the commission of the offense”. But “random virtue testing” is also illegal, where there is no reason to suspect a particular individual. Dunno if just leaving bait cars would fall under that.
Kevin 11:55 on 2023-10-12 Permalink
BC has been using bait cars for decades, and other provinces are doing the same.
They are equipped with cameras, microphones, and remote-activated kill switches, all of which combine to make for videos of people being caught in the act.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ej4r09joZfo&t=8s
mare 12:19 on 2023-10-12 Permalink
Many insurers require GPS trackers (much more sophisticated than Apple AirTags) but it doesn’t seem to help. It’s apparently quite easy to find them with a device and remove them. Containers are also excellent Faraday Cages, blocking all radio signals. Too many people make money of car theft and they have ways to stop cops from doing anything about it.
Ephraim 12:53 on 2023-10-12 Permalink
The manufacturers profit for the theft, so the only way to fix this problem is to government mandate (the UK made some changes a few years ago that required more VIN numbers on parts) OR to actually fine the manufacturers for not hardening the cars to theft and therefore selling a defective product in which you think it is secure, but it isn’t. Changes can include requiring a 128-bit encryption key on the key, so the engine can’t be jumped, or even requiring them to put in a kill switch that is cell activated. It’s amazing the changes that will occur when you point out that you can buy a machine that will unlock most cars on ebay for $50 as a manufacturing defect and require it to be fixed with a recall.
Oh and I’ve seen messages for people paying a “finder’s fee” for certain cars in Montreal with foreign plates. All you have to do is message them with the location and VIN and they pay you when the car “disappears”. (I can’t remember if it was on X, reddit or facebook marketplace)
Orr 15:02 on 2023-10-12 Permalink
No-key door-unlock and push-button engine starter so convenient tho.
Ephraim 15:17 on 2023-10-12 Permalink
Really, it’s all that hard to have a 4 digit pin or an encrypted door unlock button? They can manage it with bluetooth on some of the cars… heck, they can manage to have rolling codes on garage door openers.