More than 100 residents gathered outside the Pierrefonds-Roxboro borough hall in Montreal on Monday evening, demanding faster action from elected officials at the borough’s first council meeting since hundreds of homes in the city’s West Island flooded in June.
The turnout reflected growing frustration among homeowners who say they have spent tens of thousands of dollars repairing flood damage only to see their homes flood again. Many fear rising insurance costs, declining property values and whether rebuilding again makes financial sense.
“I’m totally paranoid now,” said Jeffrey Cooper, whose Pierrefonds home flooded in August 2024 and this June.
Cooper said in an interview outside the meeting that his family spent about $50,000 rebuilding their basement after the 2024 flood, installing a backflow valve, additional pumps and other protective measures they hoped would prevent another disaster.
Less than two years later, despite running four pumps during the June storm, water again flooded his basement, reaching close to 75 centimetres at its deepest point.
Environment Canada said about 150 millimetres of rain fell over parts of western Montreal and the South Shore within hours in the June storm.
Cooper said he never saw city crews cleaning up on his street after the flood.
At Monday’s meeting, Pierrefonds-Roxboro Mayor Jim Beis defended the borough’s response, saying emergency crews handled more than 300 calls during the storm and that the scale of the damage required weeks of cleanup.
The borough has maintained the storm was a weather event of “unprecedented intensity” that exceeded seasonal norms and standard climate models.
“We have never experienced this volume of rain in such a short period of time,” Beis said.
Borough spokesperson Marie-Pier Cloutier said in emails to The Canadian Press that public works crews, police and firefighters were mobilized immediately, special debris collections have since been completed.
Cloutier said officials continue to evaluate measures to reduce the impact of future extreme rainfall.
“Adapting to climate-related risks is a shared responsibility,” Cloutier wrote, adding that homeowners also play an important role in protecting their properties from future flooding.
Montreal Mayor Soraya Martinez Ferrada said after the June flood the city would continue investing in sewer and drainage infrastructure, while acknowledging the rainfall was so intense that even upgraded systems would likely have struggled.
She said Montreal must “think about how the city itself can become a sponge.”
As residents gathered outside the borough hall, Paul Henry Danylewich, president of the Association of Citizens of Dollard-des-Ormeaux, moved through the crowd speaking with homeowners, listening to their stories and encouraging people from across the West Island to support flood victims in neighbouring Pierrefonds-Roxboro.
“We’re tired of hearing they’re going to study the results,” said Danylewich. “The main thing is accountability and the second thing we’re looking for is action.”
Danylewich said residents want the city to move beyond engineering studies and consultations by presenting a clear timeline for infrastructure upgrades.
Requests were filed in Quebec Superior Court earlier this month seeking authorization for two class-action lawsuits alleging authorities in Montreal, including the borough of Pierrefonds-Roxboro, and Dollard-des-Ormeaux, which oversees its own local infrastructure, failed to adequately mitigate known flood risks.
Before the meeting, the Pierrefonds-Roxboro borough said the council chamber would seat about 70 people. Danylewich criticized the limited capacity, saying many residents who wanted to address elected officials would be shut out.
“This is crazy that people are having to line up to make their voices heard and the majority of them won’t be able to get in the room,” he said.
Beis also announced a new borough program that will allow experts to visit up to 75 homes in an initial phase to assess properties and recommend measures aimed at reducing future flood damage.
Resident Philipp Maux welcomed the initiative but said it fell far short of the scale of the problem.
“Seventy-five homes isn’t enough,” Maux said. “Hundreds of homes flooded.”
