November 2000
30/Nov/2000 Liberal megacity party?
By: LINDA GYULAI The Gazette
Montreal should have a federalist mayor and a municipal Liberal Party running the island if it's to become a megacity, a Montreal academic says.
Jack Jedwab, who teaches at the McGill Institute for the Study of Canada, said he's quietly eliciting positive reaction to the idea of a municipal Liberal Party from people involved at different levels of politics.
30/Nov/2000 Hey, big spender!
By: DARREN BECKER The Gazette
Suburban mayors said they plan to spend, spend, spend in 2001.
That's the word from many elected officials as they put the final touches on their budgets for next year, possibly their last municipal budgets if municipal amalgamations become reality.
30/Nov/2000 Westmount Fighting back: Cllr Lulham has been appointed head of a Committee Against Forced Mergers in Westmount. It is charged with facilitating participation in the major rally being planned for downtown on Sunday, December 10, and other opposition to Bill 170. The Rive Sud demo at Longueuil Metro (1.30 p.m.) will also be supported. A letter from the mayor is planned to be distributed next mid-week. The Lawn Bowling Pavilion has become a "war room"; organisers can be reached there at 931-1111. Remunerations: There is a requirement that these be included each year as part of the mayor's financial report. In year 2000, they were mayor: $49,300 ($11,868 as expenses) plus $26,400 from the MUC; councillors: $11,400 ($3,800 as expenses).
30/Nov/2000 PLANS UNDERWAY FOR MONTREAL MEGA-CITY
The Quebec government's Bill 170 to create a new city of Montreal is
still not law, and hundreds of mayors are still fighting against forced
mergers.
29/Nov/2000 Westmount banishes rottweiler
By: DARREN BECKER The Gazette
Queenie the rottweiler has been banished from Westmount for picking on a mutt one-fifth her size.
In Westmount municipal court yesterday, Judge A. Keith Ham gave Queenie's owner, Dimitry Zhivotovsky, 45 days to get her out of town
29/Nov/2000 Quebec holding firm on mergers
By: KEVIN DOUGHERTY; ELIZABETH THOMPSON of the Gazette Quebec Bureau contributed to this report The Gazette
Unshaken by the loss in Monday's federal election of three Quebec City-area seats held by its Bloc Quebecois allies, the Parti Quebecois government has reaffirmed its intention to press on with its sweeping plans to impose municipal mergers on the province's major cities.
Municipal Affairs Minister Louise Harel also pledged yesterday that once legislation forcing mergers on municipalities in Montreal, Quebec City and Hull areas has been adopted, Quebec will propose a new round of mergers in the Chicoutimi, Sherbrooke and Trois-Rivieres regions.
28/Nov/2000 Vision of island-wide party
By: LINDA GYULAI The Gazette
One island, one city, one island-wide Vision Montreal.
The Montreal megacity may not be law yet, but Mayor Pierre Bourque's party,
Team Bourque/Vision Montreal, amended its statutes yesterday at a convention
to enable it to become an island-wide municipal party.
28/Nov/2000 Creative tactics needed against mergers
By: NEIL CAMERON Freelance
When Mayor Pierre Bourque first ran for office, he portrayed Vision Montreal
as an instrument of botanical utopia. As usually happens, utopia has now
been converted into a campaign of Napoleonic conquest, endorsed by the
premier and the minister of municipal affairs.
The mayors of smaller municipalities have long shown bitter opposition to
complete amalgamation. Some briefly hoped that something a little better
would result from the Bernard Report. But the compromise Louis Bernard
proposed between Bourquian unification and existing urban multiplicity
turned out to be just a means of slowing down the onset of public rage.
28/Nov/2000 Bourque leads off at hearings
By: KEVIN DOUGHERTY The Gazette
Committee hearings on Bill 170, the Quebec government's proposed law to merge cities across the province, begin today with an opening brief from Montreal Mayor Pierre Bourque.
He is the leading proponent of the one-island, one-city concept copied by the provincial government in framing Bill 170. The bill would create a new city of Montreal with a population of 1.8 million.
27/Nov/2000 ATTEMPTS TO FIGHT MUNICIPAL MERGERS ON LEGAL GROUNDS
A citizen's group is asking the courts to strike down the law that would
create an island-wide city of Montreal.
27/Nov/2000 PROTESTERS SLAM QUEBEC MUNICIPAL MERGERS
Mayors from several municipalities in Quebec held a huge rally in Quebec
City Sunday to protest against a provincial plan to merge their cities.
27/Nov/2000 Round 2 of merger protests
By: SEAN GORDON The Gazette
The wave of public discontent over municipal mergers crested once again yesterday, this time in Quebec City, where about 4,500 people braved winter's first chill to listen to the amalgamation plan's most ardent critics.
Several mayors of Quebec City suburbs joined provincial Liberal leader Jean Charest in assailing the provincial government's decision to create megacities in Montreal, Quebec City and Hull.
26/Nov/2000 BOURQUE CONFIDENT MUNICIPAL MERGERS WILL GO AHEAD
Despite poll results yesterday that showed that more than half of the
population of Quebec is opposed to municipal mergers, Montreal Mayor
Pierre Bourque says he's confident the province's merger law will be
passed.
25/Nov/2000 Merger foes take their battle to court
By: CATHERINE SOLYOM The Gazette
The forced merger of municipalities in greater Montreal violates people's fundamental right to equality, says a coalition of citizens now taking its fight all the way to Quebec Superior Court.
The group, called DemocraCite, represents a growing number of people in and around the island of Montreal. It requested an injunction yesterday to stop the provincial government's merger legislation, Bill 170, pending a study of the amendment that made it possible.
25/Nov/2000 Callers rip Harel
By: MICHAEL MAINVILLE The Gazette
Callers worried about democratic rights, tax increases and labour chaos repeatedly attacked Municipal Affairs Minister Louise Harel during a Montreal radio phone-in show yesterday.
But Harel shrugged off the criticism, saying the callers' views don't represent those of most Quebecers
To hell with 'democratic rights' we want to keep our comunity and our lower Tazes!
Thursday 23 November 2000 No winners in municipal reform
Boroughs in existing Montreal could be saddled with huge tax increases to pay off city's $3.3-billion debt JON A. BRESLAW
23/Nov/2000 No winners in municipal reform
By: JON A. BRESLAW Freelance
One of the assumptions made when evaluating politics is that politicians act rationally. And as noted by many commentators on Bill 170, which would create five megacities by Jan. 1, 2002, there does not seem to be much rationale in a change that makes so many voters unhappy. While a political action might lose some votes, a rational policy must also have winners - presumably those boroughs whose taxes will decrease as the tax burden is shifted to the suburbs. Well, let's check it out.
Montreal has a net direct bonded debt of about $1.5 billion, and an actuarial deficit of $1.8 billion from when the city, during the 1960s and 1970s under Mayor Jean Drapeau, neglected to pay employer contributions into the city's employee pension funds to help fund Expo and the Olympics. Total debt is about $3.3 billion, the financing of which stands at 16 per cent of municipal expenditures. Under Bill 170, these obligations will be assumed by the island-wide city.
23/Nov/2000 MONTREAL BUDGET BOASTS SURPLUS
The mayor of Montreal says his latest budget has got a bit of everything
to make people happy. Pierre Bourque says it's got lower taxes for many
people, no cuts in services, and a small surplus.
23/Nov/2000 'Hush money' accusation over mergers
By: SEAN GORDONthe Gazette
The belligerents in the municipal merger war cranked up their rhetoric yesterday, with one suburban mayor accusing the government of buying dissenting MNAs' silence with last-minute pay increases.
"Maybe we should ask ourselves if (Premier Lucien Bouchard) didn't buy his party's silence with a raise for MNAs. They just promised them salary increases, and they've stopped talking," said Jacques Langlois, the mayor of Beauport, a Quebec City suburb.
21/Nov/2000 Harel stands firm on megacity
By: MICHAEL MAINVILLE; SUE MONTGOMERY of The Gazette and Presse Canadienne
Nothing will stop the provincial government from creating a megacity on Montreal Island, Municipal Affairs Minister Louise Harel vowed yesterday.
"We will not back up," Harel said in a speech before Montreal's Board of Trade at a downtown hotel less than 24 hours after thousands of Montreal-area residents took to the streets to oppose forced mergers.
21/Nov/2000 Saying No to Bouchardville
In a stirring speech on Montreal Island on Sunday, a politician stated, "We must not accept someone who wants to put handcuffs and roadblocks on our capacity to decide our political future. It can't be."
No, the speaker was not one of the suburban mayors addressing an estimated 18,000 anti-merger demonstrators at the Fairview shopping centre. It was Premier Bouchard at a Bloc Quebecois rally a few kilometres away.
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21/Nov/2000 Fairview coffee can't fuel a dream
By: MIKE BOONE The Gazette
It wasn't Fairview II. There weren't 18,000 demonstrators outside the Wyndham Hotel, where Municipal Affairs MinisterLouise Harel addressed the Montreal Board of Trade yesterday.
Nor was it Son of G20. The two police officers assigned to watch the demo weren't wearing riot gear and didn't have a whole lot to do, beyond asking a dozen anti-merger activists to move away from the hotel's taxi dropoff and back on to Jeanne Mance St.
21/Nov/2000 Harel stands firm on megacity
By: MICHAEL MAINVILLE; SUE MONTGOMERY of The Gazette and Presse Canadienne
Nothing will stop the provincial government from creating a megacity on Montreal Island, Municipal Affairs Minister Louise Harel vowed yesterday.
"We will not back up," Harel said in a speech before Montreal's Board of Trade at a downtown hotel less than 24 hours after thousands of Montreal-area residents took to the streets to oppose forced mergers.
20/Nov/2000 Elimination of towns an injustice
The following article was adapted from an open letter sent to Premier Lucien Bouchard by the mayors of eight Montreal Island towns: Anne Myles, Baie d'Urfe; Irving Adessky, Hampstead; Yvon Labrosse, Montreal Est; John Simms, Montreal West; Ovide Baciu, Roxboro; George McLeish, Senneville; Bill Tierney, Ste. Anne de Bellevue; and Jacques Cardinal, Ste. Genevieve.
We are taking pen in hand to condemn what could become a grave injustice toward our citizens as a whole.
20/Nov/2000 'Hands off our cities'
By: MONIQUE BEAUDIN and LINDA GYULAI The Gazette
The anti-megacity movement picked up speed yesterday with a massive rally in Pointe Claire as residents in several towns voted overwhelmingly against plans to make the island of Montreal one city.
And opponents of the one-island, one-city proposal say they will step up their protests - beginning this morning with a demonstration at the downtown Wyndham Hotel, where Municipal Affairs Minister Louise Harel is to address the Montreal Board of Trade. The board has said it supports the Quebec government's municipal-reorganization plans.
20/Nov/2000 One island, one party
One of the most ominous and far-reaching aspects of the Parti Quebecois government's megacity plan for Montreal Island is the complete transformation of local partisan politics as we know it.
The PQ scheme would usher in a new era of island-wide political parties. Indeed, in his proposal last month for municipal restructuring, the government's adviser, the politically savvy Louis Bernard, made it clear this was his deliberate intent. "Political parties," he wrote, with transparent eagerness, "will be constituted on the scale of the entire island." And although Bill 170, introduced last week, has made some key changes to the Bernard proposal, this legislation retains all the elements that would foster creation of such parties.
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20/Nov/2000 Referendums say no
By: DARREN BECKER The Gazette
While politicians and bureaucrats have been discussing the issue of municipal mergers for more than a year, residents of several Montreal suburbs finally got the chance to express their opinion on the matter yesterday by voting in referendums.
Their message - a resounding no to any attempt by the province to eradicate their communities.
19/Nov/2000 Burb merge hits a nerve
By: BILL BROWNSTEIN The Gazette
It is a place where everyone knows your ? dog's name. It is one of the most distinct burbs around, a charming bedroom community populated by downright civil folks. Damn, it's the closest thing we have to quaint Vermont on the entire bloody island.
But bliss in this burgh is not to be. If the Parti Quebecois government's master plan for municipal mergers goes through, Montreal West would be rendered extinct. Removed from the map.
19/Nov/2000 MAYORS FIGHT TO SAVE MONTREAL SUBURBS FROM MEGA-MERGER
Quebec introduced controversial new legislation on Wednesday to turn
Montreal into a mega-city, despite months of bitter opposition that
shows no sign of letting up.
18/Nov/2000 Thinking big is a megatrend
By: JOSH FREED The Gazette
One island, one pity. That's the view of our suburban mayors, who fear Quebec's plan for a megacity will reduce them to micro-status. They're convinced "mega" is a Greek word for "poor service" - and a megacity will create equally bad services for all, by dragging the suburbs down to Montreal's level.
Hampstead's wading pool will open at 1 p.m. and close at 1:30 p.m.; the Westmount Library will have a "modern history" section that ends with Plato; the megacity snow-removal policy will be: "Leave it - and it will melt."
10/Dec/2000 Follow the wind
By: PEGGY CURRAN The Gazette
Josh Freed thinks maybe it's ice-storm guilt. After all, while the rest of us easterners were freezing in the dark in January 1998, he was soaking up rays in sunny Cuba. "This was the biggest weather event in 25 years. It's like missing your own bar mitzvah."
But Freed's obsession with the weather - and the public's insatiable appetite for it - began in earnest a year ago, while the world, and every major news outlet on the continent, waited breathlessly for Hurricane Floyd.
18/Nov/2000 Merger risky for PQ
By: DON MACPHERSON The Gazette
At the Quebec Liberal convention a few weeks ago, a party strategist expressed puzzlement over why the Bouchard government was going ahead with forced municipal mergers.
His reasoning was that politically, the mergers could only hurt the Parti Quebecois. The only voters who felt strongly about the mergers were against them.
18/Nov/2000 Resounding no in Cote St. Luc poll
By: ALLISON HANES The Gazette
The people of Cote St. Luc have spoken and the answer is a resounding no.
In an opinion poll conducted for the city last week by Leger & Leger, more than 91 per cent of residents rejected the idea of becoming a borough of Montreal.
18/Nov/2000 Guarantees worthless: MNAs
By: MICHAEL MAINVILLE, BASEM BOSHRA The Gazette
The guarantees provided for bilingual services under Quebec's municipal-mergers plan aren't worth the paper they're written on, says Liberal MNA Francois Ouimet.
"(Bill 170) respects the legal rights, but de facto it could be an empty shell," said Ouimet, MNA for Marquette.
18/Nov/2000 Why municipal mergers? Why now?
By: LINDA GYULAI The Gazette
It hasn't been Peter Trent's week.
Like the 26 other suburban mayors on Montreal Island, the mayor of Westmount got his pink slip from the Quebec government on Wednesday when he learned his city is to be abolished.
18/Nov/2000 MAYORS MEET TO PLOT STRATEGY
Suburban mayors from the island of Montreal are meeting, trying to plot
a strategy to fight the province's plans for "one island one city."
18/Nov/2000 CHAREST TRYING TO BLOCK THE BLOC
Quebec Liberal leader Jean Charest is asking people who oppose municipal
reform legislation to vote against the Bloc Québécois.
18/Nov/2000 LIBERALS VOW TO FIGHT MERGERS TILL BITTER END
The Liberals are refusing to give up the fight against forced mergers,
and are vowing to keep the pressure on the government until the bitter
end.
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17/Nov/2000 Protests, meetings planned Suburbs gearing up to fight with vigour
Towns across the remapped island of Montreal are gearing up to fight with renewed vigour after the Quebec government revealed its master plan on municipal mergers Wednesday.
A series of protests, consultation meetings and public forums are planned across the island in the coming days to give residents and local politicians a chance to react to Quebec's plan.
17/Nov/2000 No mandate on mergers
The Bouchard government's one-island, one-city plan amounts to a revolution that would stifle community spirit and create a deep chasm between residents and remote decision-makers. As the fight against the plan begins, it is essential to remember that the government's mandate for making so radical a move doesn't exist.
A mandate is the political authority that voters give lawmakers to act in their name. Without signaling to voters prior to an election what it intends to do, a party once in power cannot legitimately order revolutionary changes to public institutions.
17/Nov/2000 Hit the streets: mayors
By: MICHAEL MAINVILLE The Gazette
It's not too late to convince the Parti Quebecois to drop its plans for municipal mergers, but it will take a massive public outcry from residents across the province to make it happen, suburban mayors say.
"The government has refused to listen to the mayors, so we must take the fight to the next level," Georges Bosse, the mayor of Verdun and president of the Union of Suburban Municipalities of Montreal Island, said yesterday.
17/Nov/2000 Bouchard's betrayal
By: L. IAN MACDONALD Freelance
A funny thing happened to Louis Bernard on the way to the National Assembly.
Premier Lucien Bouchard dumped him at the side of the road.
16/Nov/2000 MONTREAL MAYOR TOUTS ADVANTAGES OF MEGA-CITY
Montreal Mayor Pierre Bourque says he likes a lot of the government's
new law to create one island, one city. Bourque says it's time Montreal
caught up with Ottawa and Toronto.
16/Nov/2000 MAYORS FURIOUS AS PLAN FORGES AHEAD
Suburban mayors say they're united in their opposition to the
government's plans for an island-wide city.
16/Nov/2000 TAX WINNERS AND LOSERS IN MERGERS
There is concern about tax rates in the new mega-city.
16/Nov/2000 CONTROVERSIAL LEGISLATION INTRODUCED AMID COMPLAINTS
Quebec introduced controversial new legislation on Wednesday to turn
Montreal into a mega-city, despite months of bitter opposition that show
no sign of letting up.
16/Nov/2000 8 smallest facing axe
By: ALLISON HANES, IRWIN BLOCK
The eight smallest municipalities on the island of Montreal are fighting for their lives after the Quebec government revealed yesterday it intends to wipe them off the map.
Following the advice of merger mandarin Louis Bernard, the government's bill will force the island's eight smallest towns to melt into larger neighbouring municipalities.
16/Nov/2000 RESIDENTS FEAR VIEW OF MOUNT ROYAL WILL DISAPPEAR
Montreal's Urban Development Commission got an earful on Wednesday night
from opponents of a condominium project on Mount Royal. FULL STORY
3/Nov/2000 CULTURE MINISTER HALTS CONDOMINIUM PROJECT
Quebec Culture Minister Agnès Maltais has moved to stop a condominium
project at a site on the flanks of Mount Royal.
16/Nov/2000 Bilingual status OK
By: CHARLIE FIDELMAN The Gazette
It could have been worse.
At least Quebec's merger legislation tabled yesterday entrenched bilingual language rights for Montreal Island municipalities that already have bilingual status.
16/Nov/2000 Elated Bourque coy on running
By: LINDA GYULAI The Gazette
His faithful are already promoting him as mayor of one island, one city.
An elated Montreal Mayor Pierre Bourque, who spent 18 months and $700,000 in city funds to lobby the Quebec government to create one island-wide city, said yesterday the legislation tabled in the National Assembly is "very positive."
16/Nov/2000 Tax-bill projections
By: SEAN GORDON The Gazette
So now the question is who are the winners?
The government would say everyone comes out ahead with the proposed merger plan. The Liberals insist there's no proof that property taxes will go down appreciably.
16/Nov/2000 One island, one dictatorship
This is one of the darkest times in the Montreal region's long history of democracy. In introducing a bill to smash many existing municipalities and create new supercities on Montreal Island and the South Shore, the Bouchard government yesterday showed its determination to largely destroy the local civic life that citizens have valued for so long.
For a government that keeps insisting on its exemplary devotion to democracy, the legislation smacks of arrogance and hypocrisy.
Boroughs could be eunuchs
15/Nov/2000 By: LINDA GYULAI, SEAN GORDON of The Gazette
Even before the provincial government tables its long-awaited legislation this afternoon to rearrange the municipal map of Montreal Island, some pessimistic opponents of municipal mergers are predicting their doomsday scenarios - that is, higher costs to residents and weakened local autonomy - will come true.
And the big winner, they argue, might be Montreal Mayor Pierre Bourque, who has been promoting his one-island, one-city proposal for more than a year despite opposition from the suburbs.
14/Nov/2000 GROUP PROMISES RUCKUS IN NATIONAL ASSEMBLY
The Parti Québécois can expect more than a little disturbance when it
unveils their municipal merger law on Wednesday in the National
Assembly.
[FULL STORY]
Thursday 14 September 2000 Westmount a national historic site: study ... About two-thirds of Westmount buildings, including the Church of St.
Leon de Westmount, the site of this weekend's wedding of Caroline
Mulroney and Alexander Andrew Lapham, are considered to be of
exceptional heritage quality, featuring unusual architectural and
landscaping designs, said Joanne Poirier, director of Westmount's
building and planning department.
9/Nov/2000 MUNICIPAL MERGERS ONE STEP CLOSER TO REALITY
The Bouchard cabinet is putting the finishing touches on its plans for
mergers in Quebec's three largest metropolitan regions.
FORCED MERGERS COULD BECOME ELECTION ISSUE
The mayors of Quebec City area municipalities threatened by forced
mergers are threatening to make the issue part of the federal election
campaign.
30/Nov/2000 Case against mergers(1)
(Today, The Gazette begins a four-part series of editorials outlining this newspaper's opposition to the municipal mergers imposed by the Bouchard government.)
Premier Bouchard wants municipal taxpayers to know that, with only a few exceptions, they're the big winners in his merger scheme. On Montreal Island, an eye-popping 86 per cent of taxpayers, he says, will see their municipal taxes decline. For South Shore residents, the payoff will be almost as great - 78 per cent will save money.
Friday 10 November 2000 In Westmount, words fail Vote notice sent out in mangled English
CATHERINE SOLYOM ..Westmount Mayor Peter Trent couldn't understand it either.
The same form, a poor translation of the original French written by Quebec's chief electoral officer, was sent out last year before Westmount's municipal elections. ..It was obviously not made in Westmount. "I hit the roof when I saw it," said Trent, who prides himself on the quality of English and French in city-hall correspondence. "We were terribly embarrassed. The English is execrable."
[this is a non event but we made the front page of the gazette. DTN]
Centralization and decentralization from New York City
Since the 1960s two basic
thrusts in city government
have been in conflict in New
York City. Some say that at
issue is the very survival of
the city or of any huge city.
Others contend that the city. [britannica.com]
Westmount rejects Bernard Report
Referendum on reform to be held in November
By Martin C. Barry
Do see photos of the 600 at Vic Hall . If you were there, you are in the picture.
938 Febuary 23 issues of Amalgamation with Westmount Mayor Peter F. Trent on Quebec's nefarious Down-loading & mega-city debate Yvette Biondi "One Island One City" ..Healthcare and Clarity Bill ..David Casgrain 'heritage' Victoria Avenue home by Wayne Larsen
10 Nov 1999 Wed923LR asked that we examine: debt targets, Tax relief / reform, Social infrastructure, Internet & new tech., Productivity?, 30$ our debt owned by foreigners, .. education = we cannot compete, 7.2% unemployment not acceptable, Poverty, jobs, SOLUTIONS:, Air Canada/ONEX/Canadian, John Ciaccia, Jacques Clément, Prof Tony Deutsch, Julius Grey, Simon Potter, Guy Stanley, Robin Wohnsigl
STEPHEN JARISLOWSKY
The worm has turned. Reality, to the extent that stock-market emotions
permit, has briefly returned.
The high-tech bubble is gradually coming apart. First, it was the demise of
the dot-coms - San Francisco entrepreneurs are joining the ranks of the
unemployed. Next to fall was the computer industry, and now, it is extending
more and more to the whole sector..
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