Fluoride debate bites

Dorval was once a proud city that stood independent and didn’t need anything from anyone. It made its own decisions on everything, from police service, to fire service, and even to what it put in its own drinking water.

As we well know, that is no longer the case — in all of those circumstances. Dorval’s 50-year history of fluoridating its drinking water is being interrupted because according to local officials the Montreal agglomeration council is dragging its feet on upgrading the city’s fluoridation tanks, pumps and filtration units. The provincial government has handed over the $400,000 the city needs to update the water-filtration units to reintroduce fluoride, but the agglomeration council — which is controlled by Montreal Mayor Gérald Tremblay, whose party’s councillors hold 87 per cent of the voting power — hasn’t seen fit to let the cash change hands because it contends that as an island-wide service, Dorval’s water-filtration plant falls under its control. Although the practice is widespread in cities across the province, Montreal has never fluoridated its drinking water. Dorval only stopped doing it in 2003 when the units broke, Dorval Mayor Edgar Rouleau said, and wants to go back to it. A study of Dorval schoolchildren showed cavities have doubled since 2003.

Does anybody else get the mental image of a schoolyard bully holding a child’s hat, or tennis ball above their head, only to laugh while the children jump fruitlessly to reclaim what is rightfully theirs? Montreal is playing the part of the schoolyard bully, whose aim apparently, is to make Dorval squirm, or better, to not even let them go ahead at all. Is this what Tremblay had in mind when he said he wanted to unite people upon his initial election in 2001, or is it more like continued punishment for the suburbs that opted out of his mega-city vision.

Do the right thing and let Dorval’s kids get their fluoride back. The provincial government, who usually lead the world in red-tape delays and bureaucracy, have given the project the go-ahead, but Tremblay claims he’s waiting for the provincial government to rule on the safety of fluoridation of water, but it seems pretty clear that if the government is ponying up the cash, it’s a pretty good sign they’re fans of fluoridation.

Montreal claims it’s also waiting for more information from experts about the safety of fluoridation because there is a difference of opinion. Basically, their people think it’s bad, while Dorval’s people think it’s good.

Not to be snarky, but when it comes to information, does a city whose management (or mismanagement, as the case may be) set taxes so high local soccer associations are going to have to start paying user fees on soccer fields, really think it’s dealing from a position of strength? The city that spent its way into a $400 million deficit is going to start giving lessons on civic administration? No, thanks. Let’s give the benefit of the doubt to Dorval on this one. Montreal’s notion of waiting it out just bites.