Dumont woos West Island mayors

BY ANDY BLATCHFORD

andy.blatchford@transcontinental.ca

For Maria Tutino, the anti-merger movement was the first step and reconstitution was the second. Now, she says it’s time to finish what so many West Islanders started.

“The de-merger job is not over; getting our cities back is not over,” the Baie d’Urfé mayor said on Friday, after announcing she will back the Action démocratique du Québec (ADQ) party in the next provincial election. “We will do what it takes to have democracy returned.”

Flanked by her West Island counterparts from Ste. Anne de Bellevue and Senneville, as well as Montreal West Mayor Campbell Stuart, Tutino is calling on locals to shun the provincial Liberals and vote ADQ in the next election.

“We’re doing what I consider to be unthinkable because mayors don’t get involved in provincial elections,” she said. “(We did this) because we’ve gotten to the point where we feel we have no choice. This is the only way we’re going to be heard.”

For more than a year, mayors from Montreal’s 15 reconstituted cities have decried the structure of the island’s agglomeration council. De-merged municipalities have declared the Montreal-dominated body in charge of regional services as undemocratic and accuse the city of unfairly dumping tax burdens on suburban residents.

In his 2003 campaign, Quebec Premier Jean Charest pledged to hold a de-merger referendum to help citizens get their cities back. The vote was held in 2004, but with Montreal still in control of agglomeration, mayors say he didn’t keep his promise.

In Baie d’Urfé, Tutino says her residents are victims of double taxation.

She said the town’s taxpayers will pay agglomeration $140,000 for sewage treatment in 2007, even though Baie d’Urfé homes have septic tanks, which are paid for by owners.

This year, Baie d’Urfé was billed $400,000 by agglomeration for drinking water, an additional charge to what will be owed to Pointe Claire for the town’s actual metered consumption, she said.

“My citizens are getting abused and I’m not going to watch by idly forever,” Tutino told The Chronicle.

The mayors lobbied their MNAs and boycotted agglomeration council meetings, but nobody listened except for ADQ leader Mario Dumont, according to Ste. Anne Mayor Bill Tierney.

“We need a spokesperson, we need a champion for this cause, and he’s demonstrated his willingness to pick it up and run with it,” he said of Dumont. “What I’m interested in is somebody having the debate and not sweeping it under the carpet.”

Tierney, an organizer for Jacques Cartier Liberal MNA Geoffrey Kelley in the 2003 election, has no problem with past decisions by Dumont — who was in favour of municipal mergers.

“Do you think that Charest wasn’t jumping on us to get elected last time? They’re all opportunists,” he said.

In Senneville, Mayor George McLeish said Dumont, who voted in favour of separation in the 1995 referendum, would move to prevent any future Parti Québécois (PQ) government from holding another one.

“I don’t have a problem with their federalist stance,” McLeish said of the ADQ. “We have nothing to lose; we can be no worse off than we are now.

“Can the ADQ form a government? Who the hell knows, but at least they’re willing to talk to us.”

However, breaking into the West Island’s Liberal stronghold is a tall order for the ADQ.

In 2003, Kelley earned 30,035 votes, beating PQ candidate Guy Amyot (1,894 votes) and the ADQ’s Jeffrey Penney (1,253).

Over the past 68 years, only the Equality Party managed to grab the Jacques Cartier seat from 1989-’94.

The riding’s current ADQ hopeful, Walter Rulli, said the mayors’ support “opened up some new doors into the Liberal bastions.”

The Pointe Claire resident, and former Liberal supporter, said the ADQ believes in a “strong Quebec within the Canadian federation.”

The ADQ plans to scrap agglomeration and replace it with an independent body, which is not run by Montreal.

But details of its replacement are not complete, he said.

“Honestly, I don’t think it’s finalized because we’re not there yet,” Rulli said of agglomeration’s proposed alternative. “More of it is going to develop now that we have some people on board.”

A string of easy victories by the Liberals has spurred local MNAs to take voters for granted, he said.

“I understand (that) you fight for your party, but you’ve got to fight for the people who elected you,” he added.

Libs will continue to seek agglo

remedies: Jacques Cartier MNA

Kelley said it’s “surprising” to see the ADQ stand up for the reconstituted cities after supporting the “One island, One city” movement and inviting former Montreal mayor — and staunch merger proponent — Pierre Bourque to run as a candidate in 2003.

Acknowledging the agglomeration council has had its problems in its first year, he said the challenge is to make sure it provides an effective voice for de-merged cities.

“The government will continue to work with the mayors who want to work with us to try to find solutions,” the Beaconsfield resident told The Chronicle Monday. “I don’t accept their hypothesis that we haven’t done anything. We have made steps. Now, have they all worked? Obviously there’s more work to be done.”

Kelley noted that in December the government passed legislation to enable municipalities to shift residential and commercial tax rates and created agglomeration standing committees as “more effective” venues to debate issues.

“The proof is there that we’ve taken steps in the past and we will continue to take steps to try to fix the problem,” he said.

Kelley predicts a spring election to be called after the tabling of the federal budget.