Nunavik housing agency hopes for no evictions in 2018

The KMHB’s campaign this year aims to prevent social-housing tenants from being evicted. “It’s never too late to start paying your rent!” says this Inuktitut-language poster. (IMAGE COURTESY OF KMHB)

KUUJJUAQ—The Kativik Municipal Housing Bureau says its goal is to help tenants pay what they can in rent, rather than evict any non-payers from social housing this year.

Nunavik’s social housing corporation faces millions of dollars in arrears from unpaid rent, but opted not to evict tenants in 2017.

This year, the KMHB launched its Pay Your Rent campaign, which sends staff to tenants’ homes to help them make payment arrangements.

After Quebec’s rental board heard the cases of about 400 Nunavik social housing tenants this past summer, the KMHB has whittled down its list of possible evictions to 80, for which notices which will be sent out next week.

From the original list of non-payers, the KMHB’s board of directors removed elders and young families; the names that remained are tenants with jobs and the ability to pay, said KMHB’s assistant director, Patrick Miron.

“But even though we’ve selected 80 people to receive eviction notices, we will be going to those tenants to try and make payment arrangements,” he said.

“The objective is to have people in the community pay their rent. The objective is not to evict people.”

Once Quebec’s Régie du logement, or rental board, sent out its first notices to non-paying tenants this past spring, the KMHB staff launched a tour to each of the communities to meet with those tenants.

The KMHB’s community relations coordinator, Sonia Gosselin Alaku, said that by July, the vast majority of tenants who had received notices had made some sort rent payment.

“We know it paid off to visit them,” she said.

The remaining tenants would have been called to appear at rental board hearings held in each community over the summer—the first time the Quebec body has visited Nunavik in several years.

Gosselin Alaku called the hearings “emotional” as Nunavimmiut explained the different challenges they face keeping up with their payments.

Evictions have been controversial across the region. Nunavimmiut have complained that forcing people out of their homes leaves them homeless in a region with a housing shortage.

But paying tenants have also complained that too many non-paying renters get off with no consequences.

The KMHB’s arrears sat at $17.8 million in 2015, though the agency hasn’t released an updated figure since then.

The last time the KMHB carried out evictions, in 2016, roughly 20 households were evicted.

The eviction notices sent out by the rental board will indicate how tenants can make a last-minute payment or arrangement before the bailiff arrives. Typically, that final notice gives tenants a five-day warning before eviction.

Nunavimmiut who have received that notice can still reach the KMHB to make payment arrangements at (819) 964-2000 extension 257 or by email at sgosselin@omhkativikmhb.qc.ca.