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Montreal Gazette
2 days ago
- Politics
- Montreal Gazette
Opinion: New party aims to ‘shake up' Montreal election. It just might
With just over three months to go before Montrealers elect their new mayor, the race for the city's top job has taken a new turn with the arrival of a party promising to 'shake things up.' Independent city councillor Craig Sauvé has launched Transition Montréal, aiming to offer 'another choice for Montrealers, instead of the two older parties.' This could spell trouble for Sauvé's former party, Projet Montréal, which he represented from 2013 to 2021 before leaving following allegations of sexual misconduct dating back to 2012. With a progressive, unapologetically left-leaning platform, Transition Montréal risks splitting the vote, potentially hurting Luc Rabouin's chances of succeeding Valérie Plante as mayor — and of securing a majority at city hall this November. That could benefit Ensemble Montréal — Denis Coderre's former party, now led by ex-federal minister Soraya Martinez Ferrada. In tightly contested boroughs and districts, just a few dozen votes might be enough to swing the outcome. So instead of the two-way race many were expecting, Montrealers will now have a third option — and having more choice is usually a good thing in a democracy. While Ensemble Montréal currently faces little competition on the centre-right of the political spectrum, left-leaning voters will have not one but two parties to choose from. Depending on Transition Montréal's performance this fall, this could be a real game changer. That said, Sauvé is entering the race quite late. Building a party from scratch — including raising funds for the campaign, recruiting over 100 candidates to run in each of the city's boroughs, hiring a complete team of organizers, bringing in dozens of volunteers to help with canvassing and getting the vote out — is no small feat, especially in such a short time. It's an ambitious plan, to say the least, if not nearly impossible to achieve. Still, the party is putting forward ideas that could appeal to many of Projet Montréal's traditional supporters. One of its main promises is to further tax the city's so-called 'ultra-wealthy' — those who own a single-family home or luxury condo worth more than $3.5 million. Sauvé wants to use the resulting revenue to fund homelessness initiatives, saying it could double the current funding for such programs. Sauvé, who was first elected in the Sud-Ouest borough in 2013, also wants to make public transit more affordable for those who need it most. If elected, he plans to reduce fares for residents earning less than $45,000 a year. In short: Take more from the rich to give to the poor. Some kind of municipal Robin Hood, basically. This type of rhetoric is typical of the left — and it's likely to resonate with many Montrealers, particularly in areas where Projet Montréal enjoys strong support, such as Le Plateau-Mont-Royal, Rosemont, Ville-Marie, and Hochelaga-Maisonneuve. That's where Sauvé could do the most damage to his former party. Could there be surprises? Many will remember the 'Mélanie Joly effect' from the 2013 election. Though virtually unknown to the general public at the beginning of the campaign, she came close to defeating Coderre in the end — and even outperformed high-profile candidates like Richard Bergeron and Marcel Côté. Whether Sauvé can replicate that kind of momentum this fall remains to be seen. But one thing is certain: If neither of the two 'old parties' wins a majority and Transition Montréal manages to secure even just a few seats within city council, the new party could end up holding the balance of power — and the necessary leverage to significantly influence the next administration's agenda. And, who knows, maybe even negotiate with the new mayor to get a few seats on Montreal's executive committee — the municipal equivalent of a cabinet. Montreal's municipal marathon is just getting started. And all of a sudden, the race just got a lot more exciting.
Montreal Gazette
17-07-2025
- Politics
- Montreal Gazette
Craig Sauvé is running for mayor of Montreal with a new party, vowing to ‘shake this race up'
By Craig Sauvé is throwing his hat in the ring for mayor of Montreal alongside the launch of a new political party, The Gazette has learned. The independent city councillor confirmed the move Wednesday, saying Transition Montréal is a progressive option that wants to 'redefine the campaign.' 'We're going to shake this race up,' he said in an interview. 'We're going to offer another choice for Montrealers, instead of the two older parties. And we'll try to do it in a way that's fun, respectful and interesting.' Sauvé will officially make the announcement Thursday morning. In vying for the city's top job, he will be facing off against Projet Montréal Leader Luc Rabouin, who is also mayor of the Plateau-Mont-Royal borough, and Soraya Martinez Ferrada, a former federal Liberal cabinet minister who was acclaimed leader of Ensemble Montréal earlier this year. Sauvé said he brings the most experience with his 12 years as a city councillor and if he is elected, he will be connected to the ground and 'trying to bring people together.' When asked what he would do first if he becomes the next mayor of Montreal, he said he would 'reach out to the other teams and try to see how we can work together going forward.' 'I would have an executive committee where there's not just my party members sitting on the executive committee, but open it up to talented members of Ensemble Montréal and Projet Montréal so that we can work together,' he said. Since 2013, Sauvé has served as a city councillor representing the Saint-Henri—Little-Burgundy—Pointe-Saint-Charles district, and was first elected with Projet Montréal. He withdrew from the party caucus during the 2021 municipal election over a 2012 sexual abuse allegation he categorically denied. At the time, Sauvé said that he was already cleared of any wrongdoing, following investigations. When asked about the allegation Wednesday, Sauvé noted that both Projet Montréal and the police had investigated, and police had closed the file. He said it was something he wanted to 'address in a responsible, open, transparent, integral process' but that he is 'trying my best to move forward, with respect to everybody.' Since withdrawing from Projet Montréal in 2021, Sauvé has remained an independent city councillor. Did he consider returning to the party? He said there were discussions. 'There was a possibility there. At the same time, and this is again, I ran two campaigns federally, right? In between, I ran for the NDP twice, I came close during the byelection. After the second election, which we didn't win again, I started discussing with Projet again.' The long-time politician said he thought about it, adding he has 'very dear friends in the party' but ultimately decided against it. 'I'm not sure if that's the best motivation to do politics, you know? And to say, I want to be with this party,' he said, referring to friendships. 'I didn't feel inspired, by the recent, how can I say, the recent administration of Projet Montréal.' He said he doesn't want to bash other parties, but he was 'inspired by the project that Transition Montréal was proposing.' With his experience both behind the scenes and in office, he said he is in a unique position to 'undertake something like this.' The party will have its official launch Thursday. The new leader says he has already been working to recruit candidates and Transition Montréal plans to run them in all 19 boroughs. They want a diverse team, he added, including different linguistic and professional backgrounds. 'We want to stay above the fray of the bickering and the quarrelling,' he said. 'So we're going to try to propose this other voice for Montrealers that I think will appeal to many Montrealers.' The party will be announcing policies and candidacies in the coming weeks, he said. Sauvé mentioned two 'main pieces' will be addressed Thursday: one in economic justice and homelessness, and another in construction and public service. It will mark the third campaign for Sauvé in two years, including two attempts with the NDP in the LaSalle—Émard—Verdun. He said he didn't run because he grew bored of his current job, but he wanted to bring economic and social justice issues to a new level. 'I do love my job and I feel that this move is another way for me to bring my experience forward. And I'm excited about it,' he said.
Montreal Gazette
17-07-2025
- Business
- Montreal Gazette
Changing estimates after bids close is illegal, but Montreal did it anyway
After the sole bid on a City of Montreal contract to re-engineer the traffic lights at some intersections came in 51 per cent higher than the city's cost estimate last year, the city raised its estimate to narrow the gap. That violated the Quebec Cities and Towns Act. But the municipal department handling the call for tenders didn't stop there. Montreal's urban planning and mobility department also altered a clause in the contract tender specifications to match a noncompliant element of the bidder's offer. The $3.4-million, two-year contract that went to engineering firm FNX-INNOV Inc. passed under the media's radar. It was approved during the eighth hour of a 10-hour session of city council in June 2024, one of 50 contractual items on the meeting agenda that generated no headlines. But the contract raised red flags with the opposition at city hall, which scolded the department in council for its manoeuvres to get the contract approved. 'The million-dollar question is: Are the estimations right?' Dominic Perri, an opposition Ensemble Montréal councillor who chairs city council's contracts review committee, said in an interview last week. 'How do we know if we're paying the correct price?' His committee, which includes councillors from the opposition and the Projet Montréal majority at city hall, was created in 2011 after corruption scandals had rocked Montreal. Contracts that must be sent to the committee for review include those worth $2 million or more that either received a sole bid or have a winning bid that is 20 per cent or more above or below the city's estimate. 'What I have a problem with is when they (city departments) present a bid in front of me and the difference from the estimation is 30 to 40 per cent,' Perri said. 'In the past two years, we see this kind of spread a lot, which makes us wonder why the estimations aren't more accurate. Sometimes we get reasonable answers, sometimes we want more explanation, sometimes we find errors and we point them out.' Civil servants from the urban planning and mobility department told Perri's committee that they had estimated $2.4 million for the traffic light contract by taking the price of a contract passed in 2021 and adding inflation. When FNX-INNOV's bid came in at $3.73 million, the city department negotiated with the firm, which agreed to lower its bid to $3.4 million. (Negotiation is permitted under Quebec law when there's a sole bidder.) The firm's new price narrowed the gap with the city's estimate to 38.18 per cent from the initial 51.32 per cent. Then the city department hiked its internal estimate by $500,000 to $2.9 million, which narrowed the gap with the firm's new price to 17.27 per cent. The department told Perri's committee that the bidder had used 12-hour workdays to price the surveillance work called for in the contract. The civil servants acknowledged to the committee members that the contract tenders had specified eight-hour workdays. However, the civil servants said they had underestimated the work involved and therefore amended the eight-hour workdays to 12-hour workdays in the contract specifications. They also said they had underestimated the time required to manage the tracking of excavated contaminated soil, a new requirement in Quebec that didn't exist for the 2021 contract that served as the base for their estimate. The Cities and Towns Act says a municipality may not amend a contract after the call for tenders is closed, unless the amendment is incidental to the contract and doesn't change its nature. What is 'incidental' is a matter of opinion. However, the Act offers no wiggle room on requiring municipalities to produce internal estimates on contracts over $100,000 before opening the bids. The Quebec Municipal Affairs Department told The Gazette it can't comment on specific situations. However, the ministry confirmed that even a revised estimate must be produced before opening the envelopes. But according to a former member of Mayor Valérie Plante's Projet Montréal administration, it's 'common practice' for the city to alter its estimates after seeing the bids. 'And do you know why?' former Plateau-Mont-Royal borough mayor Luc Ferrandez, who was on the city executive committee during Plante's first term, said on his radio program on 98.5 FM in May. 'If the submitted bid exceeds the city's assessment by, say, 30 or 40 per cent, the city must publicly justify why it is proceeding anyway. And to avoid having to publicly justify why it is proceeding anyway, it will modify its assessment to reduce the difference.' Ferrandez made the assertion while discussing a recent study by the Institut de recherche et d'informations socioéconomiques (IRIS) that found Montreal's fees to private engineering firms have skyrocketed while the quality of work has diminished in the past decade. Perri's committee didn't recommend approving the traffic light contract — a first in its history, according to the opposition. The panel instead recommended suspending the awarding process and asking the Bureau de l'inspecteur général (BIG) to investigate. The committee's report on the contract 'expressed discomfort' over several aspects of the file. It noted that 'the conditions of a call for tenders should not be changed after the bids have been opened, as this could have disadvantaged other bidders who might otherwise have decided to submit a bid. This change may also suggest that the estimate was revised to make the gap more acceptable. Furthermore, it may suggest that the firm exerted influence on the department's recommendation to award the contract.' Nine firms had purchased the call for tenders package, but only FNX-INNOV submitted an offer. Less than two weeks later, the BIG issued a confidential opinion to Perri's committee: Altering the estimate and the tender specifications after the fact 'had no impact on the fairness of the contract-awarding process,' the BIG concluded. A week after, city council voted unanimously to award the contract. Perri shared the contracts committee's misgivings in council and read out the BIG's response. His colleague, Ensemble Montréal councillor Alan DeSousa, chastised the urban planning and mobility department for its actions, starting with creating an estimate 'riddled with errors.' Projet Montréal councillor Sophie Mauzerolle, a member of the city executive committee, cited the BIG's finding and said the tendering process was correctly handled. 'Certainly, some elements were omitted by the estimator, including data that could have been collected during negotiations, which explains the subsequent price adjustment,' she told council. 'But I want to reassure all my colleagues that everything was done properly.' The BIG's blessing was reason enough to greenlight the contract at council, Perri maintains. The BIG has the authority and experience to judge such matters. But even if his misgivings about the contract were allayed, Perri says he remains concerned about the city's inaccurate estimates. Montreal still uses a 'historical price' method to estimate engineering contract prices. The method takes the price of a previous contract and adds inflation to calculate an acceptable price for the bids on a new contract. By contrast, Montreal uses a 'fair value' method of estimation for construction contracts today to determine market value. The method assesses objective factors, like the real costs of items, the complexity of the work, market competition and the availability of labour. 'We would like estimates that reflect market price,' Perri said of his committee. 'It would help us do our work, and it would also help the city to better budget for its work.' A shortcoming of historical-price estimation, as the 2013 Léonard report pointed out, is it assumes that historical contract prices resulted from a free and competitive market. Colin Pratte, who authored the IRIS study, found there's little competition for Montreal's engineering contracts. Three-quarters of them are won by five firms, and a substantial portion receive a sole bid. DeSousa, meanwhile, bats the issue of what he calls 'lazy estimation' back to the BIG to investigate. DeSousa asked: Does the city regularly alter its estimates to come closer to bid prices? Have other contracts avoided scrutiny by the committee because the city narrowed the gap between its estimate and the bid price to less than 20 per cent? 'And how widespread is it?' he asked. The BIG refused to discuss the traffic light contract with The Gazette. 'The Inspector General cannot comment on a matter that has not been the subject of a public report,' BIG spokesperson Linda Boutin said. Information exchanged during the contracts committee's in-camera meetings is confidential. If it discussed the opinion it gave on the traffic light contract, she said, 'the Inspector General would be violating this confidentiality rule adopted by elected officials.'
Yahoo
02-07-2025
- Politics
- Yahoo
Ensemble Montréal mayoral candidate pledges $1M for community housing initiatives
Mayoral hopeful Soraya Martinez Ferrada, the leader of Ensemble Montréal, said that if elected she would allot $1 million to "empower community organizations and expand successful housing initiatives" to prevent families from ending up on the streets. Community organization programs she aims to reinforce include La Maison du Père's rent assistance bank, which provides interest-free loans covering up to three months of unpaid rent. Those loans must be repaid within five years. "I want July 1 to no longer be a tragedy where families end up in hotels for months or on the street. These are preventable situations," Martinez Ferrada said in a news release published on Wednesday. The former federal tourism minister and self-proclaimed "mayor of housing" found herself in hot water after the Journal de Montréal reported on her collecting a security deposit from a tenant who is renting out her family home — a violation of Quebec law. She previously announced her intentions to abolish the city's "Bylaw for a Diverse Metropolis," which aimed to have developers include social housing in new projects but failed to produce any such unit within two years of its implementation. Martinez Ferrada said at a news conference on Wednesday that she is committed to creating a housing bank to reserve affordable housing units on the market and transfer the leases to "nearly 100 households without housing on July 1" — an initiative presented in Ensemble Montréal's 2021 campaign. She said her party would create a reliable municipal rental registry to protect renters' rights, noting that the current registry is spearheaded by Vivre en Ville and is not mandatory. A report by Statistics Canada released last week shows the average asking price of rent in Montreal has shot up nearly 71 per cent since 2019. Projet Montréal commits to new guarantee fund Martinez Ferrada's announcement follows that of Projet Montréal mayoral candidate Luc Rabouin. Monday, Rabouin said his party would implement a $100 million guarantee fund to help non-profit organizations secure funding for affordable housing. "We will guarantee from 10 to 15 per cent of the amount of the banking loan to be sure they get all the money they need," Rabouin said. He noted that his party would mandate the city's municipal housing office to contact all tenants for whom Quebec's rental tribunal (TAL) issues an eviction notice to assist them in finding another residence. Rabouin said he intends to do more to reduce the wait time for issuing construction permits. As of January, the city implemented a 120-day service standard for residential projects in all boroughs.
Montreal Gazette
02-07-2025
- Politics
- Montreal Gazette
Montreal's move to biweekly garbage collection proving to be a slow process
The garbage may be piling up and causing some disgruntlement on the sidewalks of a few Montreal streets, but municipal officials say it's all part of a plan to become a zero-waste city by 2030. And they say their plan is working. 'People are making progress in their thinking, realizing that when they participate in the recycling collection, the organic waste collection, that there is not much waste left,' Marie-Andrée Mauger said. As a member of the city's executive committee in charge of ecological transition in Mayor Valérie Plante's Projet Montréal party, Mauger is the point person overseeing a switch that has reduced the frequency of garbage collection in some neighbourhoods to a biweekly pickup. Three boroughs — St-Laurent, Verdun and Mercier—Hochelaga-Maisonneuve — have started implementing the plan, which is also a part of Plante's pledge to 'make Montreal the greenest city in North America.' But residents in Mercier—Hochelaga-Maisonneuve are not thrilled with the stench. Jonathan Haiun, a spokesperson for Ligue 33, a community group in eastern Montreal that advocates for quality of life issues, said spacing out the collection hasn't had the desired effect since it was brought in late last year. 'The problem seems to be some people who just aren't composting or at least not doing it properly, and then a lot of the stuff that we do find in the garbage is just a mix of everything,' Haiun said. 'What we have been asking for since the beginning is that they go back to collecting garbage every week because we don't feel that that's actually an ecological measure.' According to the most recent survey results conducted for the city and obtained by Ensemble Montréal, the opposition party at city hall, about 54 per cent of residents polled consider switching to trash pickup every two weeks 'unacceptable.' Meanwhile, other major Canadian cities have had biweekly pickup for years: Toronto since 2008, Halifax in 1999 and Vancouver in 2013. In each case, there were growing pains, but all happened hand-in-hand with organic waste collection. Mauger said she expects once composting extends to 100 per cent of the city by the end of 2025, things will begin to shift. According to the Léger city survey, less than half of Montrealers use the so-called brown bin to dispose of organic waste and their knowledge of what goes in the bin has only risen by one per cent, to 41 per cent, since 2021. The survey results aren't surprising, and transition rarely comes without complaint, said Karel Ménard, a Montreal environmentalist. 'I think it's a shared responsibility between the citizens and the municipality, which has an obligation to have a clean and healthy city,' said Ménard, head of Front commun québécois pour une gestion écologique des déchets, an organization that promotes ecological waste management. 'Also, I would even say the producers, because what we often see in the alleys are short-lived, disposable items, so there's also a problem of overconsumption.' Many municipalities in the Greater Montreal area and elsewhere in Quebec have switched to biweekly pickup, if not every three weeks or monthly in some cases. But Greater Montreal is mainly suburbs with single-family homes, which isn't the case in the city's boroughs. 'There are 900,000 doors in Montreal, plus 40,000 businesses, industries and institutions that have municipal collection,' Mauger said. 'We estimate that 80 per cent of the buildings in Montreal don't have their own driveway, so it's not really one size fits all.' The zero waste plan places an emphasis on reducing food waste, more composting and recycling. The city has also prohibited the use of single-use plastic items, like cups, utensils and straws. Opposition councillor Stephanie Valenzuela of Ensemble Montréal said the polling results suggest Projet Montréal has a lot of work to do. 'The results really speak to the amount of energy and investment the city has been putting into informing residents on the goals that we're trying to achieve,' Valenzuela said. Valenzuela said the public reaction also contrasts with how the administration has portrayed itself as being innovative and avant-garde when it comes to the environment. 'We've seen that when it comes to their big promises, when it comes to the environment, they're actually missing the mark,' Valenzuela said. But Mauger is confident the city will be able to extend biweekly pickup to all 19 Montreal boroughs by 2029. 'What we see in this poll, it's also that three-quarters of the population are aware of the problem of sending too much waste to the landfill that's filling up at a very high pace,' Mauger said. 'And they want to do more to be part of the solution … so that's really promising, too.' This report by The Canadian Press was first published July 2, 2025. This story was originally published July 2, 2025 at 10:16 AM.
