Team ensures Inuit landing in Montreal get where they need to go
Reaching Home and Urban Inuit program meant to keep travellers safe while in city
Joey Partridge, director of the Reaching Home and Urban Inuit program, briefs his team at the Montreal airport Wednesday after the morning’s Air Inuit and Canadian North departures. (Photo by Cedric Gallant)
There’s a new team helping to guide Nunavimmiut while they travel to and from the Montreal airport.
With the airport often being the start of homelessness for those travellers, front-line workers from the Reaching Home and Urban Inuit program, organized by Makivvik Corp., want to ensure that won’t be the case anymore.
Program director Joey Partridge is taking care of departures for Air Inuit and Canadian North with his two co-workers.
“We are making sure Inuit are guided, supported and informed properly,” he said. “We are here to interpret and translate as well.”
The team started their work March 4 but the project has been in the works for a year. According to Partridge, the airport is often the first place where Inuit can encounter problems that lead to homelessness.
He has also worked as a liaison officer with Montreal’s homeless community and said there were 100 to 150 Inuit experiencing homelessness in 2021-22.
This is the armband Nunavimmiut should be looking out for if they are ever in need of help at the Montreal airport. (Photo by Cedric Gallant)
That number rose to 350 last year.
“It is a serious number,” Partridge said of the increase. “This is a number that we have never seen before.”
The team of five workers is divided into two groups.
One group works mornings from 8 a.m. to 4 p.m., starting their shift at the departure desks for both Air Inuit and Canadian North to help everyone with their flight.
Afterward, they scout around the airport to see if anyone was left behind or is lost. They make their way outside toward Dorval, all the way to Ullivik, the boarding home for medical patients from Nunavik, a distance of nearly three kilometres, picking up anyone who needs help along the way.
The evening team works from 3 p.m. to 9:30 p.m., making their way from Ullivik to the airport, and they take care of arrivals coming from Nunavik.
During the weekend, the same process is done but between 10:30 a.m. and 6:30 p.m.
Some questions they may ask are: “Where are you going? Do you have a plan to stay somewhere? If you get lost, do you know where to call?”
“We make sure they are welcomed properly in the city,” said Partridge, “but most importantly, inform them about the dangers.”
Situations that could lead to homelessness vary person to person.
It could be people trying to prey on Inuit by pretending to be taxi drivers or caseworkers. Sometimes it’s miscommunication with charter bus drivers from Ullivik or hotels, or a lack of identification papers.
The team also offers help to people who are released from detention centres or mental health facilities.
Partridge said often these people are only given taxi vouchers or a bus ticket.
“When they get there, they sometimes don’t have [identification], they don’t have a way to get a ticket for themselves,” he said.
If someone is refused a seat on their flight due to a lack of identification, Partridge can help because he has access to the Makivvik Corp. offices. Whenever needed, he can laminate a backup beneficiary card and return it in time for takeoff.
This situation happens often because reprinted identification is accepted when travelling within Nunavik, but the Montreal airport does not accept this type of ID.
And if there is a need to find someone a place to sleep, the team can organize a stay in a hotel room.
“Don’t be shy to come to us if you have a question,” said Partridge. “We try to not leave anyone behind. We want to support everybody as much as possible.”
I saw that , a few time , at the good old SATELLITE BAR , drug dealer asking if you need any drugs.
Ajunngiitusii Nuavimmiut! Joey Ikajunnginagasuasuu! Nakurmiingujusii ilunnasii!! Qujalitsiaqtunga, qujannamiik!
Sad, but same as when inuit go to edmonton winnipeg and ottawa, many just decide that they rather be homeless in the south where it’s warmer than have to deal with homelessness in the arctic.
A Inuit Organization is now a large Baby Sitting Service for the Inuit of the North. This is so sad. Showing the rest of the world that some of the population of the Inuit community needs baby sitting services.
What is sad is your complete lack of knowledge on the subject.
Inuit must be flown in from the north because of the utter lack of infrastructure including hospitals and quality medical care. Lack of infrastructure includes proper housing which leads to overcrowdedness and respiratory diseases (such as TB which is still rampant in the north). Throw in historical forced settlement, relocation, residential schools and intergenerational trauma and you have a major mental health issue on your hands that leads to drug and alcohol abuse which cannot be properly treated because… you guessed it… there are no mental health supports in the north.
God forbid an Inuit organization does something positive for once and you come along with you lack of intellectual thought and intelligence and spew your ignorant comments on the internet. Bravo.
A harsh realization showing up in the south, where some think that people have it much easier, only to realize that the south isn’t handing out free housing, utilities, and grocery money.
This is so crazy. When and if Inuit travel to southern cities either for vacation or medical reasons, they either choose to stay sober or get drunk. They get drunk because the liquor and beer are cheaper and more available. They get drunk and “they” decide whether or not they want to take a flight to their northern destinations. They choose to make the excuses of life is to hard at their home in the Arctic and they decide to stay down south and then become homeless. I was homeless in the Montreal and Ottawa area and I learned that in order for me not to be homeless or alone, I had to change my alcoholic lifestyle and become a productive member of society. Don’t go blaming others for your difficult choices in life.
Pigutjauvitaasiit? They are doing it for us. Like how welfare is doing it for us. Like how soup kitchen do it for us. Like how KMHB fix our rent for us. We never get taught how to do it ourselves. I guess there is more money for the individuals doing it for us… instead of teaching us.
I think I would be better off if I quit my job, and started depending on their services
I can barely pay my bills
I think KMHB should open a branch at Cabot Square and help the Inuk out. That warm feeling , reminder of back home.
350 Homeless inuks in one city , that is unreal.
this service isnt just for drunks druggies or the homeless..its for the Nunavik elders and ppl who dont understand english and french.. this is soo Nunatsiarungituk news. a corporation does something positive for its people it serves… negitivity is just around the corner.
It is hardly anyone’s first time on medical travel, so they know where purchase alcool.
everyone who made a negitive comment… shame on all of you who never lifted a finger to help an elder.