Infamous Nunavik residence moving by January 2011
Health board seeks new 100-bed patient home in Montreal
This patient home in Montreal home will move from its notorious location on St. Jacques to a new location by January 2011, Nunavik health officials say. (FILE PHOTO)
KUUJJUAQ — By January of 2011, Nunavimmiut receiving medical care in Montreal will have a spacious new residence.
The Nunavik regional board of health and social services isn’t ready yet to announce exactly where the new 100-bed facility will be located.
But it’s likely to be located close to Montreal hospitals and in a former health facility that can easily be renovated to meet standards.
A Feb. 25 news release from the health board says the move to relocate Nunavik’s patient services in Montreal comes in response to a recent regional campaign to relocate Nunavik House away from its grotty location on St. Jacques St. in the southern end of Notre-Dame-de-Grace.
Many Nunavimmiut voiced their concerns about the patient boarding home’s location on Facebook, over local FM airwaves and via an online petition created by Aupaluk’s Janice Grey-Scott: http://bit.ly/cUB9aB
“Like most of the persons who signed the petition, the organizations responsible [for the delivery of health services]… share the same preoccupations,” says the Feb. 25 health board news release.
More than 150 people signed the petition asking for Nunavik House to move.
“This area is known to be gang territory, is surrounded by shady motels and bars, and drugs are abundant and distributed to Inuit,” the petition reads.
“We find it unacceptable that the most vulnerable segment of our population is exposed to such dangers on a daily basis.”
One signatory said gang activity and gun violence is common in the area.
Another noted that women at Nunavik House and the nearby 28-bed Hampton residence are at risk of being harassed as they walk around the neighbourhood.
Nunavik House opened in 2000 in what was formerly a low-end motel for immigrants at 6177 St. Jacques St.
Due to the high cost of running smaller family-run transit houses, the health board contracted a local company to run the 50-bed boarding home.
The location was chosen originally for its proximity to McGill University’s future mega-hospital, which still hasn’t been started.
Only months after Nunavik House opened its doors, residents began to complain about the surrounding neighbourhood, which features seedy hotels and a bar across the street that has reportedly been taken over by Hell’s Angels.
A local corner store ran a brisk business selling drugs to Nunavimmiut before it was busted.
A plan to move Nunavik House was suddenly shelved and forgotten- “as if it never existed”— after a committee spent two years in discussions, an inside source told the Nunatsiaq News in 2006.
The plan to move was mainly motivated by saving money caused by the costs of housing overflow patients and escorts at the Travelodge hotel in Dorval, private boarding homes or downtown apartment hotels.
Having patients scattered all over the island of Montreal has also obliged Northern Module drivers to wrestle with heavy traffic every day and caused patients sometimes miss their appointments.
A committee was given a mandate to find a new, more cost-efficient location for the Northern Module and patient residences.
This committee’s progress was outlined in a June 2004 French-language document prepared by a consultant, which was called “MNQ: locaux de l’organisation, situation actuelle et future”
[The Northern Module: the organization’s location, its current situation and the future”].
It noted patient numbers increased by 11.4 per cent in 2004 over the previous year and that up to 40 patients were regularly housed in hotels.
“This state of affairs presents many inconveniences and dangers to the health and security of beneficiaries,” the document says.
The committee charged with finding a better location for the Northern Module and patient residences located a building in Dorval for rent, which had three floors and a cafeteria, but would have required $3 million in renovations.
The committee recommended pursuing the purchase of Foyer Dorval, a large residence in the centre of Dorval. There were even plans drawn up for its renovation.
But then the plans to move Nunavik House and the other patient services now in NDG stalled until recently.
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