by PATRICK LEJTENYI

A little spare cash lying around can prove to be a good thing. Two years ago, in a much-publicized victory, the province's anti-gang warriors descended on the Hells Angels in Quebec and Ontario, netting 122 bikers and seizing over $4-million in cash and assets. While the wheels of justice turned slowly (the mega-trials are still underway, after a series of delays including the construction of a new courthouse and changing the presiding judge), the city debated on what to do with the dough. On Feb. 5 of this year, they finally came to a decision.

The city council's executive committee, according to highlights released the next day, "authorized expenses for crime-related projects, to finance large-scale operations, purchase specialized equipment and prevention activities by the city police department, including the use of the proceeds from crime." Those expenses include some $824,000 in funding for a two-year, anti-gang and juvenile prostitution initiatives in 15 boroughs. Singled out as areas of concern are downtown, Montreal North and Côte-des-Neiges/NDG. Additional money - exact figures haven't been announced yet - will be made available later in the year to the boroughs, which will implement initiatives tailor-made to suit their particular needs. The Côte-des-Neiges area has particular ones.

For years, the neighbourhood around Plamondon metro especially was a by-word for street gangs, composed for the most part of young south-east Asian kids, usually Filipino, Cambodian and Laotian boys. The two biggest were the Red Bloods and the Blue Crips, borrowing the tags from the notorious Los Angeles street gangs. Violence, drug-dealing and harassment were common complaints throughout the '80s and '90s. Now, it seems like it's time for a clean-up.

But according to at least one community activist, the city fathers have missed the boat. The problem today isn't nearly as bad as it once was, and what gangs stalk the streets today have little in common with the Uzi-toting badass gangstas of Compton and Watts.

Don't believe the hype

"The gang problem really isn't that bad," says Roderick Carreon, a 28-year-old Filipino and the coordinator of Kabataang Montreal (KM), a Filipino youth-outreach group and drop-in centre. "The gangs are localized in the schools, and it's been a long time since there's been an altercation."

A former labour organizer, Carreon formed KM in 1999, with the purpose of getting kids out of gangs and having them put their energy to more useful ends. Run out of the basement of his Côte-des-Neiges duplex, Carreon describes KM as a progressive, politically active organization that deals with the realities other organizations may be more squeamish about: drugs, teen pregnancy, ethnicity, parental problems, Filipino politics and American foreign policy, all of which are linked, he says. His organization took part in the recent anti-war and anti-police-brutality marches. But gangs, and more importantly the conditions that make gang membership attractive to potential members, are his main focus.

"The gangs are a bunch of kids," he says. "All the so-called gangs were formed in schools as a kind of self-defence mechanism against racism, being isolated and taken from one place to another. They're looking for the same kind of people." (By that he doesn't mean ethnic background, although he does say that various gangs were once composed of kids of the same country of origin. "Now it's based on how cool you are.")

Carreon knows what he's talking about. He arrived in Canada from the Philippines in 1986, age 11, and soon got involved in gangs himself - "I went through the same crap, made the same mistakes," he says - but got a taste of politics after being fired from a factory job. He says that in his day, the gangs were more hard-core, dealing drugs and carrying weapons. That isn't the case today, he states, even if the police might think otherwise.

Not so mean streets

Every Friday night, KM holds a meeting to plan activities and discuss whatever topics are on the agenda. By 8 p.m., Carreon's doorbell is constantly ringing and a parade of young Filipinos stream through the front door and head downstairs. It doesn't take long before the small, cramped basement becomes packed with people ranging in age from their mid-teens to mid-20s, all trying to make room for themselves among the pool and foosball tables. Hip hop blares out of a small portable radio.

Most of the members have similar histories, having arrived in Canada a few years ago and experiencing the confusion, isolation and family strain common among many immigrant families. Chuck, a 20-year-old who has been an off-and-on KM member for two years, doesn't like to talk about his years as a gang member other than to say that he tried to escape the life by moving to London, Ontario, for a year. He moved back, and has found the neighbourhood changed.

"In 1999 and 2000 [gang violence] was a lot worse," he says. "Now it's just kinda chill. There's not really any more violence, at least not in the past three months. But Filipinos are still being stopped by police. They'll ask for your passport and check your immigration status and do random checks."

Archie, his 19-year-old friend and fellow KM member, agrees, complaining of increased police harassment and spot ID checks. Another former gang member, he says he spent his time "hanging out, fighting, trippin' outside - whatever it is that gangs would do, we'd do. But we didn't sell drugs."

Carreon sees a pattern of police action continuing from what he saw when he arrived in Canada almost 20 years ago. "In the '80s," he says, "it was the Jamaicans who were harassed. Then it was the Vietnamese. Now it's the Filipinos, it's us who are being targetted… And youth are an easy target because usually they can't complain."

Time tough

To be sure, street gang violence in Montreal isn't a joke. The Bo Gars and Crack Down Posse in Montreal North, for instance, have been making waves for years, and are taken very seriously by the police. In the fall of 2001, the police's Morality, Alcohol and Narcotics squad began "Opération Journal," an investigation into a rash of firearm thefts blamed on the Bo Gars. Gang members were suspected of being behind up to eight home invasions, where they would find legitimate classified ads offering to sell guns, set up a meeting with the vendor, then storm the house and steal everything of value. In June 2002, the police arrested the alleged head of the Bo Gars, Chénier Dupuy, and eight others whom they say made up the "hard core" of the gang's leadership. The arrests in February of two men, one a metro security guard, in connection with a juvenile prostitution ring also highlighted the fact that Montreal still has problems with organized crime despite the biker busts.

All this is on the minds of the city's political braintrust. The cycle of drugs, prostitution and dependency has been one the politicians, police, academics and social workers have been struggling for years to figure out and break, and many are hoping that the $4-million Hells loot windfall will help.

"We're hoping that the money will go to those who are the biggest victims of organized crime, from everyone who has ever had their car stolen to the prostitutes and drug addicts on Ontario," says Robert Laramée, city councillor for Saint-Jacques in Centre-Sud and a member of the city's public security committee. He takes credit for getting the ball rolling on the proceeds of crime measure in the first place. "We want to develop relationships with these people and make them realize that they are victims of a well-organized system," he says.

Root causes for concern

All well and good, but the question of how the money will be spent is an open one. In Côte-des-Neiges, one answer the city thinks is appropriate is the building of a $900,000 community and recreation centre in Mountain Sights, a crowded, immigrant-heavy and generally poor neighbourhood. And according to local councillor Michael Applebaum, there is already perhaps a surplus of community organizations dedicated to helping new arrivals and youth.

"There are many different organizations out there, and what we have to try to do is bring them all together and work under one roof. That's how you build a city," he says. When asked about the city funding and harassment concerns Carreon has raised, he says, "There are many different Filipino community organizations, and [the dearth of services available] depends on who you are speaking to and who they represent."

As for new policing measures, Applebaum says that there aren't any new measures yet, but that the city is "studying different scenarios" as the administration prepares to reorganize the island-wide police force.

But Applebaum recognizes that community policing is already changing the relationship between the cops and the people on the street. "Before, the police were farther away, and now they're a lot closer," he says. "They're more involved in the day-to-day running of the city, they're getting closer to community organizations and the people on the street. The tensions between the citizens and the police are down, not up."

Not according to Carreon. His organization has a no-dialogue policy with the police, and with, according to him, between 500 and 600 members, that's a lot of people who aren't feeling particularly close to the forces of law and order. And while he has met with city officials, including Applebaum, he has more often than not come away disappointed.

"If the city doesn't want to provide money [for KM], we're not going to sit around and wait for the financing," he says. "This is the third place we've been in. We were kicked out of the others by the housing authorities. When I went to the city, they offered us one hour a week in a gym. We don't need a gym. We need help in addressing the root causes of why immigrant kids can't adjust."