Photo: SHAPEM
The stately greystone building used to be a retirement home for nuns in Montreal, Quebec. In December 2019, they sold it to SHAPEM, a non-profit organization that creates and manages inclusive, sustainable community housing. "We'll be housing people with low incomes, the elderly, have a daycare, it's really mixed," says Jean-Pierre Racette, SHAPEM's general director. With the help of the FTQ Solidarity Fund, SHAPEM paid about $2.5 million for the building, which they will gut to create about 80 units of affordable housing, and turn the large yard into a community park. SHAPEM is one of about a dozen organizations in Montreal working to keep housing affordable that, together, have either bought or built about 23,800 housing units over the last 30 years; 6,200 more are on the way. But there's a big need still. In Montreal, about 40,000 people are on a waiting list for social or affordable housing.
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