Weaving a political web

As municipal elections loom closer on the horizon in Quebec, it appears the use of the Internet as a political campaigning tool, traditionally confined to provincial and federal electoral battlegrounds, may become more of a staple in the West Island leading up to Nov. 1.

"What the Internet does is that it allows you to campaign at a more affordable format," said Michael Labelle, a former Pierrefonds councillor who is re-entering the fray with a fully-formed blog on politics in his borough and Montreal, as well as a party he has officially registered, the Parti des Citoyens Pierrefonds-Roxboro.

As the latter is an independent party with no access to big campaigning budgets, Labelle said traditional methods of campaigning—going to door-to-door with volunteers, distributing glossy pamphlets, buying air time—are a little more difficult for small fry.

"With (online video sharing site) youtube or something, you can go out and express yourself," Labelle said.

Started off only two weeks ago, his blog picks apart the quasi-daily back-and-forth between the two main political parties in Montreal, incumbent mayor Gérald Tremblay's Union Montreal, and rival Louise Harel's Vision Montreal. It also occasionally criticizes current Pierrefonds/Roxboro Mayor Monique Worth's Union Montreal council.

Though he ran as a candidate for borough mayor in 2005 with Tremblay's then-rival Pierre Bourque's Vision Montreal, Labelle is hoping to gather a fresh slate for his independent party this time around, with an emphasis on local management.

"The Internet is phenomenal for getting information out to people," Labelle said, adding it is also a way to hopefully reach a younger audience, and get them involved in politics, even to run with him.

"I don't know much about blogging or computers," the 53-year-old financial adviser added, but he is experimenting on attracting search engine attention. Last week, he created two new blog pages with no actual content besides the words "Monique Worth" and "(current councillor) Bert Ward," in order to attract search engine queries with those words toward his blog page. It does not seem to work quite yet on Google, since the terms lead to Pierrefonds' official site or elsewhere.

Due to his unfamiliarity with the software, Labelle said he is not sure how many visits he has been receiving since he launched the blog in August.

Over in Ste. Anne de Bellevue, however, Senneville resident Gaétan Provost has been running his own blog on the town since summer 2008, and has received over 12,000 unique visits in 2009 alone, according to statistics he sent to The Chronicle. "I try to do as much journalistic work as possible," said Provost, a former producer with French-language media such as TQS and Radio Canada for many years. With what he perceived as budget cuts in local media and a general lack of interest among big newspapers toward smaller towns and villages, Provost had been feeling a lack of interest for Ste. Anne. "Of course, it is a blog," he conceded," so I don't always have to be objective. I criticize and I inform," he added.

Lately, even as he continues to write about events in Ste. Anne such as two fires that shook the small community over the course of the summer, posting pictures and videos as well, Provost has also been actively campaigning for change in the small town, seeking political candidates. "They're coming together, and there's definitely a coalition," he said of candidates that have banded up, though he was not ready to name names. "I don't know if they'll form a party," he added.

As a Senneville resident, Provost cannot run in Ste. Anne for council, though his father once ran against current Mayor Bill Tierney in 2001.

There is little Internet activity among incumbent mayors or councillors in the West Island area. Beaconsfield Mayor Bob Benedetti has been experimenting with social networking tools such as Twitter or Facebook, but has stopped updating the former account with new posts due to a lack of interest. "I didn't find it that useful," Benedetti said, recalling there were not that many followers on it besides a couple of reporters and "a pizzeria in Mississauga."

"My Facebook page is slowly getting there," he added, stating he had, at last count, about 29 Facebook friends.

Benedetti said he kept a blog during his last campaign in 2005, but has not decided whether he will do so again, nor if he will start up a website.

"Nothing beats old-fashion campaigning," he said, adding he would prefer to go door-to-door to meet citizens.

With its smaller population of approximately 19,000 in comparison to Pierrefonds/Roxboro's 65,000, that could prove more manageable to him.

Whereas Benedetti does not seem to care much for online campaigning, at least one of his rivals, Hela Labene, has already set herself up online with a website introducing herself, along with a brief overview of her issues with the current council. She could not be reached for comment as of press time.

The trend of municipal online campaigning is not a big surprise, according to McGill University political science professor Dietlind Stolle, who also seemed to think it is only natural for relatively unknown quantities to put more of an emphasis on it. "If you want to carry around a new idea and you want to form a new party, and you have a new platform, I think that the Internet can do a lot, even attract people outside of your immediate constituency," she said.

"When it comes to small constituencies, and when it comes to people who are already known, they are probably better off canvassing and shaking hands personally," she said.

Stolle added local-level online campaigning may be just picking up, but studies have already shown how influential blogging has been among larger populations in Senate seat races south of the border.

However, she warned against losing oneself to cyberspace completely. "The online tools are very effective, but probably not to the total neglect of face to face," she said.



Bob Benedetti’s Facebook page:

facebook.com/mayor.benedetti



Michael Labelle’s Pierrefonds/Roxboro blog: pierrefonds-roxboro-news.blogspot.com



Hela Labene’s Beaconsfield website/blog: beaconsfieldelections.com



Gaétan Provost’s Ste. Anne de Bellevue blog (in French): sos-democratie-sab.blogspot.com