Anonymous submission to MTL Counter-info
I am writing this as someone living in the landlords’ Gabriel Paré and Annick-Patricia Carrière’s buildings. I’m writing this anonymously because my neighbors are currently being sued by our landlords. They are being sued because they attended or hosted tenant meetings and signed a petition for lower rent increases, and because SLAM then carried out a campaign of pressure supporting demands that came from our buildings. It was suggested by a friend that I post this here, so here it goes.
In 2025 and 2026, my neighbors organized together and hosted meetings to fight a rent increase. For some people it was about 6.3% in 2025 and one building, people were getting more than 9%. I have to say that in this past year, I wish I had been more active. I have to admit that one part of me was trying to avoid conflict with our landlord because I am afraid of losing my home or going to housing court, I’m afraid of the money they have and the power they have over my life. Another part of me convinces myself that these rent increases haven’t been that much because I like to avoid the need for conflict even though I have a lot of stress about my finances. These increases certainly don’t help. But I really can’t tolerate anymore how this landlord is treating people in our buildings. I don’t want to do nothing as people I know are bullied.
I want to say that the people in SLAM living in our buildings that I have met have always been kind to me. They’ve always said hello with a smile. They’ve cooked and baked for us. They’ve always made time to talk, invited me for tea, and talked me through things and questions I had, and they never asked for anything in return. I really appreciate that and I really appreciate their bravery. It’s really hard for me to imagine motivating myself to knock on doors, to talk to strangers even if they’re my neighbors, and I have a lot of trouble imagining myself having the guts to go do a protest about my landlord. I do know how to write a little bit though, so that’s what I’m doing here.
On October 7th, two people in our buildings got a legal notice that they and SLAM were being sued by the landlord for an injunction. I got a copy of the injunction request and read it. The two tenants are being accused of:
1) signing a petition against their rent increase (a petition signed by 21 tenants)
2) attending or hosting tenant meetings
3) refusing their rent increase in 2025 and 2026.
The union is accused of:
1) organizing a BBQ against the rent increase
2) messaging artists that are apart of our landlords’ artistic agency
3) flyering three times outside events associated with the agency (events that all still took place as scheduled)
4) postering outside of an event venue that was hosting an event connected with the agency.
All of these last three actions were done with written material explaining why there is a boycott being organized of artists apart of our landlord’s artistic agency.
Do we live under a dictatorship? Do we live under fascism? How is any of this worth a lawsuit? People talking to each other, meeting, explaining their perspectives and arguments, people handing out information. Why is any of this supposed to be illegal? Is it only illegal because these actions are affecting people who can afford lawyers?
The landlords are spending their money that they make from our rents, the money we make from our work, to do these lawsuits. I don’t know why they don’t just meet people in the buildings’ demands. It would probably be cheaper. It’s all so horrible to imagine the kind of desire for control and power that would motivate someone to give money to lawyers so that they can make sure they can keep taking more money from tenants. It’s the opposite of robin hoods: they’re giving to the rich to keep stealing from the poor.
Now, there’s been an injunction against SLAM so that the union can’t speak out about this landlord and their artistic agency any longer. During a housing crisis, our landlords are suing this city’s tenants’ union. At this point, this is much more than just a rent increase, it is aggressive and expensive legal action that is attacking an organization of poor and working people. In my eyes, artists who continue to hire these landlords are now not only standing by the landlord’s rent increase, but are standing by as this landlord sues an organization that has been important to so many vulnerable people. Apparently none of the artists wrote back to the union after the union wrote to them requesting their solidarity, just like the landlord never answered the petition in 2025.
I want to encourage people to keep going. People from other groups, other individuals, other collectives that believe in this kind of work, other housing committees, anybody!
Keep doing actions to put pressure on the landlord. Keep doing actions to put pressure on their artistic agency. The landlord needs to be told that this isn’t right what they’re doing and that these increases are too high for some of us. If SLAM can’t continue, you can.
The landlord obviously has a choice, whether they can see it or not. There will be pressure from all sides on their artistic agency until it develops a reputation in the industry as a pariah and slowly or quickly loses artists and becomes unable to get new ones. Why the landlords would want to lose an artistic agency they have put so many years of work into, before coming to the negotiating table with a collective of tenants, is beyond me. I hope they will eventually realize it just makes more sense, is cheaper and faster, to just meet the pretty reasonable demands of the people who live in their buildings.
The following artists directly and knowingly contributed to the lawsuit drafted by the landlords :
– Sylvain Lapointe (Trio Hochelaga)
– Dantonio Pisano
The landlords are being represented in court by Vincent Kaltenback of Barrette & Associés.
Here is a list of some of the landlords’ agency’s upcoming shows:
– 10 octobre: Dominique Beausejour-Ostiguy – Diffusions Amal’Gamme (Prevost, Quebec, Canada)
– 11 octobre: Benoit Gauthier – Orchestre Philharmonique du Quebec (Boucherville, Quebec, Canada)
– 13 octobre: Janina Fialkowska – Ottawa ChamberFest (Ottawa, Ontario)
– 14 octobre: Elinor Frey – Accademia de’Dissonanti – Salle Bourgie (Montreal)
– 14 octobre: Dominique Beausejour-Ostiguy – Miroir Ephemere (Montreal)
– 15 octobre: Chloe Dumoulin – Jeunesses Musicales du Canada (Montreal)
– 15 octobre: Dominique Beausejour-Ostiguy – Miroir Éphémère (Montreal)
– 15 octobre: Caity Gyorgy (Maison de la Culture Ahuntsic)
– 16 octobre: Trio Hochelaga – Theatre du Lac Brome (Ville de Lac Brome, Quebec)
– 17 octobre: Andrew Wan – Guelph Symphony Orchestra – River Run Centre (Guelph)
– 17 octobre : Dominique Beausejour-Ostiguy (Montreal)
– 17 octobre: Buzz Cuivre – Theatre du Cuivre (Rouyn-Noranda, Qc)
– 18 octobre: Antony Ratinov – Sedona Symphony (Sedona, Arizona)
– 18 octobre: The Isabel Bader Centre for the Performing Arts (Kingston, Ontario)
– 18 octobre: Buzz Cuivre – Centre culturel de Val-d’Or salle felix leclerc (val d’Or, Qc)
– 19 octobre: Buzz Cuivre – Theatre des Eskers (Amos, Qc)
– 20 octobre: Buzz Cuivre – Theatre des Eskers (Amos, Qc)
– 21 octobre: Janina Fialkowska – Gustin House – St. John’s Anglican Cathedral (Saskatoon, Saskatchewan)
– 21 octobre: Buzz Cuivre – Theatre du Rift (Ville-Marie, Qc)
– 22 octobre: Caity Gyorgy – Cinquieme Salle – Place des Arts (Montreal)
– 22 octobre: Charles Richard-Hamelin – Orchestre Symphonique de Sherbrooke (Sherbrooke)
– 22 octobre: Dominique Beausejour-Ostiguy
– 23 octobre: Caity Gyorgy – Cinquième Salle – Place des Arts (Montreal)
– 24 octobre: Dominique Beausejour-Ostiguy – Le Vitrail – Espace culturel (Thetford Mines, Quebec)
– 25 octobre: Caity Gyorgy – Theatre du Marais (Val-Morin, Quebec)
– 25 octobre: Dominique Beausejour-Ostiguy – Eglise Saint-Charles (Montreal)
– 25 octobre: Buzz Cuivre – Sala de Conciertos Biblioteca Luis Angel Arango (Bogota, Columbia)
– 28 octobre: Dominique Beausejour-Ostiguy – Orchestre symphonique de Laval (Laval)
– 29 octobre: Caity Gyorgy – Cabaret-Theatre du Vieux-Saint-Jean (Saint-Jean-sur-Richelieu, Quebec)
– 1 november: Trio Hochelaga – Isabel Bader Centre for the Performing Arts (Kingston, Ontario)
– 3 november: Rémi Bolduc Jazz Ensemble – Maison de la culture de Côte-des-Neiges (Montreal)
– 4 novembre: Buzz Cuivre – The Carolina Theatre (Durham, NC)
– 5 november: Charles Richard-Hamelin – Toronto Symphony Orchestra – Roy Thomson Hall (Toronto, Ontario)
– 7 november: Charles Richard-Hamelin – Toronto Symphony Orchestra (Toronto, Ontario)
– 8 november: Charles Richard-Hamelin Toronto Symphony Orchestra – Georg Weston Recital Hall (Toronto)
– 10 november: Remi Bolduc Jazz Ensemble – Maison de la culture de Cote-des-neiges (Montreal, Qc)
– 12 november: Dominique Fils-Aimé – Théâtre du Vieux-Terrebonne (Terrebonne, Quebec)
– 13 november: Chloé Dumoulin (Nouveau!) – Diffusion Mordicus – Salle Jean-Cossette (Amqui, Qc)
– 14 november: Dominique Fils-Aimé – Theatre Granada (Sherbrooke, Qc)
– 14 november: Charles Richard-Hamelin – Windsor Symphony Orchestra (Windsor, Ontario)
– 14 november: Trio Hochelaga – Diffusions Amal’Gamme (Prevost, Qc)
– 14 november: Chloé Dumoulin – Maximum 90 – Quai des Arts (Carleton-sur-Mer, Qc)
– 15 november: Charles Richard-Hamelin – Windsor Symphony Orchestra (Windsor)
– 17 november: Rémi Bolduc Jazz Ensemble – Maison de la culture de Cote-des-neiges (Montreal, Qc)-
– 19 november: Andrew Wan – Orchestre symphonique de Montreal (Montreal)
– 19 november: Dominique Beauséjour-Ostiguy (Nouveau!) – Festival International Bach Montréal – Palais Montcalm (Quebec, Qc)
– 20 november: Chloé Dumoulin – L’Anglicane (Levis, Qc)
– 20 november: Dominique Beausejour-Ostiguy – Festival International Bach (Quebec, Quebec)
– 21 november: Andrew Wan – Orchestre symphonique de Montreal (Montreal, Qc)
– 22 november: Elinor Frey – Les Ondes (Quebec, Qc)
– 28 novembre: Buzz Cuivre – Salle Desjardins Maria Chapdelaine (Dolbeau-Mistassini, Qc)
– 29 novembre: Buzz Cuivre – Salle Michel Cote (Alma, Qc)
– 6 decembre: Buzz Cuivre – Pavillon Wilson (Couteau-du-Lac, Qc)
– 9 decembre: Buzz Cuivre – State Theatre for the Arts (Red Bluff, California)
I’ve typed up a version of a flyer I got before the injunction was ordered that you can work with. Keep an eye out for any posts here about people in our buildings and the landlords reaching a deal, because then it wouldn’t make sense anymore to move forward with more actions.
No one asked me to post this. I don’t want this to have any blowback on SLAM or on the two tenants living in our buildings that got unfairly singled out – because none of them asked me to write this. I’m writing this because it feels like the right thing to do. I won’t leave my neighbours behind as they get sued by our landlord and misrepresented in court. I’m not the bravest person in the world. And in a world where a rich person can own dozens of other people’s homes and where people do the worst things imaginable to make some money, maybe it’s silly to believe in helping others. But, then I meet people like the people in the union who care about other people without ever even making a dime off of it or trying to become famous. This is just a small gesture of solidarity for every time they offered me some solidarity. It’s literally the least I can do to help.
The Flyer’s Text :
[FR:]
Au cours de l’hiver 2025, des dizaines de locataires de Gabriel Paré et d’Annick-Patricia Carrière ont subi des hausses de loyer supérieures à 6 %, voire à 9 % pour certain.e.s. En mars 2025, vingt et une personnes résidant dans ces immeubles ont signé une lettre collective dans laquelle elles estimaient que la hausse de loyer imposée par Paré et Carrière pour 2025 était trop élevée au regard des capacités financières des locataires, et énuméraient des demandes précises concernant plusieurs de leurs immeubles. Après nous être organisé.e.s avec d’autres locataires, avoir fait du porte-à-porte, organisé un événement communautaire public contre ces hausses de loyer et mené une nouvelle vague de mobilisation pour refuser ces hausses en 2026, nous n’avons toujours pas reçu de réponse du propriétaire à notre demande de négociations collectives.
Notre syndicat appelle à boycotter dorénavant les artistes associé.e.s à L’Agence Station Bleue. L’agence est gérée et détenue majoritairement par les propriétaires Paré et Carrière. Nous appelons le public à ne plus acheter de billets pour leurs événements tant que les propriétaires n’auront pas satisfait les revendications des locataires.
Le coût de la vie échappe à notre contrôle individuel! La solidarité est notre meilleure défense! Vous voulez lutter contre les propriétaires, renforcer notre autonomie et abolir le loyer? Joignez-vous à notre syndicat et aidez-nous à lutter pour un monde meilleur!
Envoyez un email pour encourager cette salle à ne plus engager cet artiste, tant qu’un accord n’aura pas été conclu avec les locataires!
[EN:]
In the winter of 2025, dozens of tenants of Gabriel Paré and Annick-Patricia Carrière received rent increases higher than 6% and others higher than 9%. In March, 2025, twenty-one people living in these buildings signed a collective letter expressing that Paré and Carrière’s 2025 rent increase was too high for tenants’ financial capacities, listing specific requests across several of their buildings. After organizing with other tenants, door-knocking, holding a public community event against these rent increases, and another wave of rent hike refusals in 2026, we still have no response from the landlord to the request for group negotiations.
Our union is calling for a boycott of artists associated with the agency going forward. Agence Station Bleue is managed and majority owned by the landlords Paré and Carrière. We are calling for the public to not get any more tickets to their events until the landlords meet tenants’ demands.
The cost of living is spiralling out of our individual control! Solidarity is our best defence! Want to fight landlords, build autonomy, and abolish rent? Join our union and help us fight for a better world!
Encourage this venue to refrain from booking this artist again until a resolution with tenants is reached!