2025 Municipal Elections

Woo and Weiser out as candidates; poll gives Marchand lead

Local Journalism Initiative / / / , , , , , , , , , ,

Woo and Weiser out as candidates; poll gives Marchand lead

Peter Black, Local Journalism Initiative reporter

peterblack@qctonline.com

Week two of the Quebec City campaign featured the exit of prominent candidates for two of the main parties running for City Hall, an encouraging poll for Mayor Bruno Marchand, and an original “fourth link” idea from a mayoral candidate.

David Weiser, a prize catch for Marchand’s Québec Forte et Fière (QFF) party when the tech pioneer, nonprofit founder and interfaith relations advocate joined his administration, was removed from the QFF slate over a broken “bond of trust.”

Marchand opted to remove Weiser from his re-election bid in the Plateau district following a report in the Journal de Québec that Revenu Québec had registered a legal hypothec (a form of legal mortgage) on his residence over a tax dispute covering the years 2012 to 2015.

The Journal also reported Weiser had declared personal bankruptcy that was registered in 2021, the year he became a city councillor.

In a statement, Marchand said, “I had a discussion with David … at the end of which I decided to withdraw his candidacy for QFF in the Plateau district. His explanation of the facts brought to my attention has broken our bond of trust.”

Weiser told Radio-Canada he had explained his situation to Marie-Josée Savard, the leader of the party he ran for in the 2021 election, but acknowledged that he did not disclose it to Marchand or his party after he crossed the floor in February 2022.

“I think I was treated unfairly,” he said. “There is an outstanding debt to Revenu Québec, but the legal hypothec is still in effect.”

Weiser said, as is required of elected officials, he submitted his notices of tax assessment to the party every year. Weiser had not responded to the QCT’s request for an interview by press time. QFF has until Oct. 3 to find a replacement candidate in the district.

Sam Hamad’s Leadership Québec had to scramble to find a last-minute candidate as a result of the withdrawal from the race of Napoléon Woo, the party’s purported star candidate in Saint-Roch– Saint-Sauveur. Shortly before this newspaper went to press, on Sept. 29, Radio-Canada reported that Hamad had selected social worker Pascale Houle, who does not live in the district, to represent the party there.

Woo, owner of a local restaurant, exited the team following controversial remarks he made at his candidacy announcement about homelessness in Saint-Roch.

Québec d’Abord, meanwhile, continues to face a challenge in finding candidates for all 21 seats on council with the Oct. 3 deadline looming. As of this writing, the party that evolved from former mayor Régis Labeaume’s organization is still short six candidates. Leader Claude Villeneuve is running for mayor but also for re-election in his Maizerets-Lairet district.

A lack of candidates is not Villeneuve’s only challenge. A Léger poll for the Journal de Québec placed the Opposition leader a distant fourth in the race for mayor, at seven per cent, slightly behind Stéphane Lachance of the upstart right-wing Respect Citoyens party.

The poll found Marchand with a significant but not commanding lead over Hamad, a former provincial Liberal cabinet minister and MNA for Louis-Hébert. Marchand polled 27 per cent in the field of seven candidates, with Hamad at 20 per cent, followed by Lachance and Villeneuve. Transition Québec Leader Jackie Smith had three per cent, and former city councillor and Opposition leader Anne Guérette had one per cent.

The poll also identified the cost of housing as the most important issue in the election, at 38 per cent. The second greatest preoccupation of potential voters was homelessness at 29 per cent. Just behind were public transit at 28 per cent, traffic congestion at 27 per cent, and infrastructure projects like the “third link” at 24 per cent.

On that latter topic, Guérette, who came third in the race

for mayor in 2017 as leader of the now-defunct Démocratie Québec party, has proposed a plan for a “fourth link” between Quebec City and Lévis.

Guérette, an architect and former councillor for Cap-aux-Diamants, is proposing a bridge be built exclusively for public transit in addition to one for car and truck traffic.

In a slick video on her campaign Facebook page, Guérette, a radio commentator and opponent of the tramway in its current configuration, said the public transit bridge, situated to complete a transit loop with a third link, should be built first. She said it could be built with efficient and inexpensive technology for $2.2 billion within four years.

Guérette and her running mate Frédéric Imbeault are seeking election in the Cap-Rouge–Laurentien district under the Parti du Monde banner. As of this writing, the party has not announced any other city council candidates.

Woo and Weiser out as candidates; poll gives Marchand lead Read More »

Electoral campaign heats up in Saint-Roch

Local Journalism Initiative / / / , , ,

Electoral campaign heats up in Saint-Roch

Ruby Pratka, Local Journalism Initiative reporter

editor@qctonline.com

The road to Quebec City Hall leads through Saint- Roch.

The neighbourhood is different things to different people. To some, it’s the heart of Lower Town’s nightlife, food scene and still-vibrant tech sector, home to several theatres and the bright new central library. To others, it’s a close-knit working-class neighbourhood where people share the little they have. To still others, it’s a symbol of post-pandemic decline, with tourists rolling suitcases toward dubiously legal “ghost hotels,” past clusters of homeless people and half-empty office buildings.

As the campaign for the mayor’s office has ramped up, candidates have increasingly focused on the borough. The current city councillor for Saint- Roch–Saint-Sauveur, Pierre-Luc Lachance of Mayor Bruno Marchand’s Québec Forte et Fière (QFF) party, is not running again; QFF has recruited Marchand’s former press attachée, Élainie Lepage, to run there. Marchand recently met with businesspeople in Saint-Roch, and announced $100 million in funding over 15 years – mostly infrastructure upgrades – to the neighbourhood.

Transition Québec (TQ) and leader Jackie Smith have recruited a star candidate of their own, former CKIA radio host Marjorie Champagne, and opened their campaign headquarters in the former Benjo toy store on Rue Saint-Joseph.

Leadership Québec (LQ) leader Sam Hamad initially recruited restaurateur Napoléon Woo to run in the district; Woo stood down after publicly accusing community organizations in the area of perpetuating homelessness in order to keep their jobs. Shortly before this newspaper went to press, Hamad named a new candidate, social worker Pascale Houle.

Québec d’Abord leader Claude Villeneuve and candidate Quentin Maridat countered with an announcement of their own on Rue Saint-Joseph, accusing Marchand of  overpromising and underdelivering on homelessness and Hamad of stigmatizing Saint-Roch. Respect Citoyens has recruited restaurateur Mélanie Leroux.

Community groups and business representatives the QCT encountered are wary of being seen to take sides in the upcoming election, but they are eager to show the candidates “their” Saint-Roch.

“Saint-Roch is downtown, it’s the heart of the city, and there’s downtown life that goes with that,” said Marc-Antoine Beauchesne, president of the SDC Saint-Roch business owners’ association. “We kind of lost our rhythm from before the pandemic, but we’re getting it back now.”

“There’s a big issue around homelessness and mental health, and we have secondary problems coming from that…. We need to work on that and it will solve everything else,” he said, adding that the SDC didn’t believe in “hiding” homeless- ness or other signs of poverty or distress, but rather working toward shared solutions. “We’re ready to contribute.”

“Saint-Roch is the subject of a lot of conversations,” said Marie- Noëlle Béland, executive director of L’Engrenage, a community organization based at Église Saint-Roch. “For example, the problem of businesses [leaving] Rue Saint-Joseph, you read that it’s ‘because of homelessness,’ but the causes are a lot larger than that. There are fewer workers in the neighbourhood because of telecommuting; people have less disposable income because the cost of housing has risen so high.”

L’Engrenage recently released a 174-page “portrait” of Saint-Roch, laying out the neighbourhood’s history as a bustling hub for middle- and working-class francophones that has gentrified rapidly in the past few decades. It also released a questionnaire for the candi- dates, with a series of questions about urban planning, mobility, housing, economic and cultural life and civic participation.

“For urban planning, for example, many people don’t have private yards, and there aren’t many parks with picnic tables. We don’t have a lot of drinking water in public places, and the same goes for public washrooms, laundromats, trash cans, benches, ashtrays, shady spots or places where people who are homeless can safely leave their things. These are things that would be really helpful for the people themselves, and for cohabitation in general. Mobility is another thing. We want to quiet the traffic and make the roads and sidewalks safer for pedestrians and cyclists. There need to be more public benches, for older people, people with disabilities and anyone who’s carrying a heavy load. … There’s also the question of [short-term rental ghost hotels], increasing surveillance to find illegal Airbnbs, but also seeing what we can do to keep housing on the residential market.”

L’Engrenage plans to send the questionnaire this week and make candidates’ responses public. Until then, Béland is keeping an open mind. “We’re ready to talk to any of the candidates. … It’s interesting to see that the people running are interested in the neighbourhood. That’s a good thing. But should this campaign be about homelessness? Obviously, homelessness concerns everyone, but … there are people who seem to believe that it’s mainly a municipal issue, when the resources are more on the side of the Quebec government. It’s a little risky. I don’t want to minimize the impacts of homelessness, but I don’t want to stigmatize the whole neighbourhood for it either.”

Electoral campaign heats up in Saint-Roch Read More »

And they’re off! City Hall campaign begins with feud between Hamad and Villeneuve

Local Journalism Initiative / / / , , , , , , , ,

And they’re off! City Hall campaign begins with feud between Hamad and Villeneuve

Peter Black, Local Journalism Initiative reporter

peterblack@qctonline.com

The signs are going up, candidates are filing their papers and voters are being asked to reflect and choose who they want to run their towns and cities.

Quebec City, along with some 1,100 other municipalities in the province, is now engaged in an election campaign that will culminate with the election of new civic representatives on Nov. 2.

So far six candidates have declared themselves in the running for mayor: incumbent Bruno Marchand of Québec Forte et Fière; Claude Villeneuve, leader of Québec d’Abord and councillor for Maizerets-Lairet; Jackie Smith, leader of Transition Québec and councillor for Limoilou; Sam Hamad, leader of Leadership Quebec and a former provincial Liberal cabinet minister and MNA for Louis-Hébert; Stéphane Lachance, entrepreneur and leader of Respect Citoyens; and Anne Guérette, an architect, former city councillor and past mayoral candidate, who is running as an independent although she has registered a party name, Parti du monde.

Even before the 45-day campaign began officially on Sept. 19, two candidates were engaged in a skirmish of personal attacks. Villeneuve accused Hamad of intimidation for allegedly saying to him at an event in April, “Be careful with your criticism of me, because you have two beautiful little girls.”

Villeneuve said Hamad repeated the comment at another event. There were no witnesses at either occasion to corroborate Villeneuve’s claim. Hamad asked Villeneuve to withdraw the accusation, which he said amounted to defamation.

It was not the only accusation of intimidation aimed at Hamad last week. Karine Gagnon, the veteran Journal de Québec reporter and municipal affairs columnist, wrote a piece in which she said Hamad “has taken the liberty, during and outside of his press briefings, of attacking my integrity and my reputation, as well as those of the Journal de Québec.”

In another incident in a rocky start to his campaign, Hamad’s candidate in the Saint-Roch–Saint-Sauveur district, restaurant owner Napoléon Woo, went on a rant against the problem of home- lessness in the district.

“Homelessness should be a period of transition, not a culture where you eat for free, you get free housing, you get free clothes … No one died of cold or hunger,” Woo said, as Hamad listened uneasily and then intervened. (Editors’ note: Napoléon Woo is no longer the party’s candidate in Saint-Roch-Saint-Sauveur. On the afternoon of Sept. 22, as this newspaper went to press, Hamad announced that the party had “put an end to” his candidacy.)

On a more positive note for Leadership Québec, the party now has city council candidates in 20 of the 21 districts. A last-minute change saw Patrick Paquet, most recently the non-elected leader of the now-defunct Équipe Priorité Québec (EPQ) party, become the party’s candidate in the Les Saules- Les-Méandres district after Lydie Pincemin withdrew for health reasons. As of this writing, the party has a full slate of candidates, except for Woo’s recently vacated district of Saint-Roch-Saint-Sauveur.

The only other established party not to have a full slate is Villeneuve’s Québec d’Abord, which, as of this writing, was still short six candidates.

Respect Citoyens, meanwhile, has a full slate for its first run at City Hall, including Eric Ralph Mercier, former ÉPQ councillor, former Liberal MNA for Charlesbourg and son of longtime Charlesbourg mayor Ralph Mercier. He’s running in the Des Monts district.

Another notable recruit for the party is Anne-Laurence Harvey in the Loretteville– Les-Châtels district. Harvey is the daughter of Luc Harvey, the former Conservative MP for Louis-Hébert. She has a claim to fame in being the first girl to score a touchdown as a quarterback when she played for the St. Patrick’s High School Fighting Irish football team.

With the election campaign just underway, a poll in Le Soleil had some good and some worrisome news for Marchand and his bid for a second term. The survey by the SOM firm found 51 per cent of respondents were satisfied with his work as mayor, the highest level in two years and a major uptick since a low of 36 per cent two years ago.

However, in a somewhat counterintuitive finding, 50 per cent of those polled felt it was time for a change at City Hall. The poll also found Marchand’s approval rating is less positive in the suburbs, particularly in Charlesbourg, Beauport and La Haute-Saint-Charles.

In the 2021 election, QFF won four of its six seats in downtown districts.

It was not by coincidence, then, that Marchand officially launched his campaign Sept. 19 at a historic site in Charlesbourg.

“We’ve achieved a lot in four years, and there’s still a lot to do. There’s momentum in Quebec City, and we want it to continue. We’re not going to take anything for granted,” Marchand said.

In 2021, Marchand beat Marie-Josée Savard, the inheritor of former mayor Régis Labeaume’s party which later became Québec d’Abord, by 834 votes.

With files from QCT staff

And they’re off! City Hall campaign begins with feud between Hamad and Villeneuve Read More »

TRAM TRACKER: Laurier contract bargain, Hamad wants work pause

Local Journalism Initiative / / / , , , , , ,

TRAM TRACKER: Laurier contract bargain, Hamad wants work pause

Peter Black, Local Journalism Initiative reporter

While mayoral candidate Sam Hamad is calling for work on the tramway to be halted during the municipal election, the city has awarded the second largest contract of the project – which came in well below the estimated cost.

On Sept. 17, the city executive committee approved a contract of $63.2 million, taxes included, to Charles-Auguste Fortier Inc. for, as it’s described in the call for tenders, “the redevelopment of Boul. Laurier, for the transitional state before the installation of the tramway.”

It is the second largest contract awarded so far for the TramCité project, the largest by far being the $1.3- billion deal with transportation giant Alstom for supply and maintenance of the system’s rolling stock. The 34 all- electric “trainsets” would be manufactured at Alstom’s plant in La Pocatière. The maintenance contract is for a 30-year period.

Four companies were bidding for the Laurier project, with the highest being $91.7 million, a figure still lower than the $95 million (before taxes) the city had projected.

The winning bid is more than 40 per cent below that target. Charles-Auguste Fortier Inc. has been in business for more than 50 years, and among the company’s notable endeavours is the excavation for the Vidéotron Centre.

The city is responsible for the majority of the preparatory work for the tramway system. The rest is handled by the Caisse de dépôt et placement Infra division (CDPQ Infra), which the Coalition Avenir Québec government tasked with over- seeing the $7.6-billion first phase of the tramway project.

Boul. Laurier has been undergoing major construction work for the past four years; partly for the tramway and partly for a huge project to rearrange the approaches to the Quebec and Pierre Laporte bridges. The new contract would extend the work on the street for about another four years.

Meanwhile, tramway opponent and mayoral candidate Hamad is asking that work on the project be frozen during the municipal election campaign that officially started Sept. 19.

Hamad, founder of Leadership Québec and a former provincial Liberal cabinet minister, said in a media encounter outside City Hall before the Sept. 16 council meeting, “I’m asking [Mayor] Bruno Marchand to stop all current or future work until the election on Nov. 2.”

Hamad quickly clarified his comment, saying work currently in progress should continue, since stopping would “involve penalties and problems.” He said the city should “stop adding to [the work], because we must let the citizens decide.”

When reporters reminded Hamad that the Quebec government is committed to the tramway project, he said, “It doesn’t matter. The mayor of Quebec City will decide what’s best for Quebec City. The mayor of Quebec City will be elected on November 2. It will be the will of the citizens of Quebec.”

Marchand quickly rejected Hamad’s suggestion. He told reporters, “We won’t stop the tramway. We have an agreement with the ministry of transportation. We have a partner called CDPQ Infra that is doing the work. We have an agreement to do preparatory work ourselves. We will face penalties if we don’t do it on time.”

Newly named Transport Minister Jonatan Julien echoed the mayor’s comments. He told a media scrum before a Sept. 17 cabinet meeting that it was “out of the question” to pause tramway work, warning there would be penalties.

“The tramway, we committed to doing it. Right now, we are doing it with CDPQ Infra, and it is moving forward.”

Hamad is proposing an upgraded bus system as an alternative to the tramway.

TRAM TRACKER: Laurier contract bargain, Hamad wants work pause Read More »

Hamad adds former mayoral hopeful Hamad to team

Local Journalism Initiative / / / , , ,

Hamad adds former mayoral hopeful Moisan to team

Peter Black, Local Journalism Initiative reporter

peterblack@qctonline.com

Sam Hamad’s campaign has one more candidate and the mayoral race has one less, with Leadership Québec adding Daniel Moisan to the team as its standard-bearer in the Montcalm–Saint-Sacrément district.

Moisan is described on the Leadership Québec website as “a marketing entrepreneur and multidisciplinary artist who has worked in business and culture for over 35 years.” He will face incumbent Coun. Catherine Vallières-Roland, who won the seat for Bruno Marchand’s Québec Forte et Fière (QFF) by a 16-point margin.

Moisan had entered the race for mayor in June, declaring on social media: “Politicians see themselves as people who rule, much more than people who serve the citizens.”

He appears to be opposed to the tramway project, saying it “won’t solve traffic.”

“My big dream,” he said, “if there’s one project I care about, would be for public transit to cost users $1 a day.”

Hamad, a former provincial Liberal cabinet minister and MNA for Louis-Hébert, added two more candidates in recent days, but as of this writing, Leadership Québec still lacks four to complete a slate for the 21 council seats.

The other recruits are Hugo Langlois in Vanier-Duberger (an open seat with the exit of Alicia Despins of Québec d’Abord), and Vicky Lépine, running in Cap-aux-Diamants against QFF incumbent Coun. Mélissa Coulombe-Leduc, a member of Marchand’s executive committee.

Langlois is a well-known media personality and son of former Beauport mayor and Quebec City councillor Jacques Langlois. He came a respectable second in the April federal election, running for the Conservatives in Beauport- Limoilou.

Lépine is a founding member of the Mouvement Saint-Jean Baptiste and a member of her neighbourhood council. Her party bio says she “has more than 20 years of experience in human resources management and public administration.”

She was involved in a controversial incident at a February city council meeting; when making a long preamble to a question, she raised her arm repeatedly in a gesture that Marchand called a “Nazi salute.” He subsequently withdrew the comment and apologized to Lépine.

As of this writing, of the seven parties running for Quebec City Hall registered with Elections Quebec, only QFF and Transition Québec have fielded a full slate of candidates.

The municipal election campaign across Quebec officially kicks off Sept. 19.

Hamad adds former mayoral hopeful Hamad to team Read More »

Villeneuve launches campaign; ‘Happy to be underdog’

Local Journalism Initiative / / / , , ,

Villeneuve launches campaign; ‘Happy to be underdog’

Peter Black, Local Journalism Initiative reporter

peterblack@qctonline.com

Although he doesn’t have all of his candidates yet and the official start of the municipal election season is still two weeks away, Québec d’Abord Leader Claude Villeneuve launched his City Hall campaign Sept. 4.

“Why not?” he said. when asked by reporters. “I’m ready.” His launch, held on the sunny terrasse of a brewpub in Montcalm, included the unveiling of a detailed platform of policies to be put into place over a three-term period, ending in 2037.
Under the tagline “Près de vous” (“Close to you”), Villeneuve explained the platform has three principles: “Simplify services to make them more accessible, bring people together behind major projects, and invest in the future to improve everyday life today.”

Some of the major planks: Abolish the “welcome tax” for the purchase of a first home, create a major sports centre in Parc Victoria, reduce the vehicle registration tax to $30 from $60, build 60,000 new housing units by 2037, and create a major event in partnership with Wendake to mark the 500th anniversary of French explorer Jacques Cartier’s visit to Quebec in 1535.

With polls showing him far behind incumbent Mayor Bruno Marchand of Québec Forte et Fière and Leadership Québec’s Sam Hamad, a former provincial Liberal minister, Villeneuve said he has “a lot of work to do” to make himself known.

Villeneuve leads the rem- nants of the party that ruled Quebec City from 2008 to 2021 under then-mayor Régis Labeaume. The party’s leader in the 2021 election, Marie-Josée Savard, lost the mayoralty to Marchand by 834 votes.

Her party, though, elected 10 councillors and formed the official Opposition. Of those 10 councillors, there are now only two – Villeneuve, in the Maizerets-Lairet district, and Véronique Dallaire in Les Saules-Les Méandres. The others chose not to run again or defected to Marchand’s party.

Québec d’Abord, as of this writing, has recruited only 10 of the 21 candidates for a full slate. Villeneuve hinted at the press conference there were even some candidates yet to be announced in the room.

Villeneuve said, “I think I’m the second choice of many people, if not most people in the city” and that he doesn’t “have much further to go to become the first choice.”

He said he’s been talking to people who think Marchand “does not deserve a second mandate” and that Hamad “is not a serious candidate.”

Asked in English how it feels to be the underdog in the mayoral race, Villeneuve said, “I like to be the underdog. It’s a good story to tell.”

He said, “I’m ready to be mayor. I’m pretty confident, but it will be tough, and it should be tough to become mayor of Quebec. You have to earn it.”

According to his Québec d’Abord bio, prior to becoming a city councillor in 2021, Villeneuve “served as an adviser and speechwriter to Premier Pauline Marois. He then made a name for himself in Quebec City’s media landscape as a columnist for the Journal de Québec.”

Villeneuve also founded Limoilou-based AV3 – Collaboratoire, a shared workspace that supports local startups.

Originally from Métabetchouan, in Lac-Saint-Jean, Villeneuve came to Quebec City in 2002 to study law and economics.

Villeneuve launches campaign; ‘Happy to be underdog’ Read More »

Smith unveils full slate, gets booted from council

Local Journalism Initiative / / / , , , ,

Smith unveils full slate, gets booted from council

Peter Black, Local Journalism Initiative reporter

peterblack@qctonline.com

A day after Transition Québec Leader and Limoilou Coun. Jackie Smith unveiled a full roster of candidates for City Hall, she was expelled from a city council meeting for breaching rules of conduct.

Nearly four years after her run for mayor as the head of an avowedly left-wing party, Smith’s feisty approach has earned her an eager following and, seemingly, the enmity of some fellow councillors.

On Aug. 25, Smith convened the media in Jardin Jean-Paul-L’Allier in Saint-Roch to announce her party had recruited candidates for all 21 districts, including many who decided to run for a second time under Smith’s leadership.

In introducing the candidates, she said, “We have assembled a strong, bold, dynamic team rooted in its community. The team has been on the ground for several weeks and the party’s funding is breaking a historic record. This demonstrates the enthusiasm for ideas that focus on fairness, solidarity and respect for the environment, and that respond to the challenges of our time.”

The next day, during a city council debate over the city administration’s public consultation program, council speaker Bianca Dussault ordered Smith to leave the chamber.

Smith had refused to withdraw an accusation that Cap- aux-Diamants Coun. Mélissa Coulombe-Leduc, member of the executive committee responsible for heritage, urban planning and tourism, was biased due to a job she had as a lobbyist prior to becoming a city councillor.

Coulombe-Leduc said, “I want her to withdraw the comments she just made, which have nothing to do with my role as a municipal councillor. If she wants me to dig into her past, I will do it.”

Dussault, describing Smith’s comments as “a rather personal attack,” ordered her to leave the meeting, which she did peaceably.

The council meeting was the second last before the official municipal election period starts on Sept. 17, leading to voting on Nov. 2. It’s an election Smith hopes will bring her, if not the mayor’s office, at least a larger contingent than her solo seat in Limoilou.

Smith said that “everything is different” from the last time around in 2021. “Recruitment is just so much easier. The fact that people know me, they know what we do … I’m a woman of action, and accessible, and people sort of feel close to me, feel like they can tell me their issues and I can help them.”

She said, “The four years of experience have been huge” and she’s learned “a lot more about how the system and the political dynamics work.” Plus, she said, the party has made “many gains” over that time in targeting issues and moving the administration forward on such matters as shelter for homeless people, protected bicycle paths and measures for parents at City Hall.

She said she has been effective despite being the lone Transition Québec councillor. “I have an idea and a lot of people say, well, no, it’s not possible. But in my four years, it almost always starts like that. I go in the media, I propose something publicly and then [Mayor] Bruno Marchand says immediately, ‘That’s impossible. You’re crazy.’ And then six months to a year later, it exists.”

In that vein, at the news conference to announce candidates, she denounced the Sept. 5 deadline for voters to change their address online. “The complexity of the process for changing addresses discourages young people from voting. It’s a structural obstacle that could be easily resolved.”

Smith is also calling for public transportation to be free on election day, as is the case in Lévis. “Voting should be simple and accessible for everyone. Free transportation on election day is a concrete measure to achieve this, and one that has already proven effective.”

As for her mayoral prospects in a field of at least four other credible candidates, Smith said she feels she has a “real chance” this time around; she finished fourth in 2021, with 12,000 votes, 6.6 per cent of the total.

She had initially been concerned about the impact of former provincial Liberal minister Sam Hamad, “because he’s a big name,” but said he has not lived up to billing, having failed to recruit a full slate of candidates only a couple of weeks before the campaign starts.

Smith, the mother of two young children, is a native of Hamilton, Ont., and has lived in Quebec City since 2006. She has several links to the English-speaking community, including with the Quebec Art Company and the Morrin Centre, where she is currently a member of the governing council.

Smith unveils full slate, gets booted from council Read More »

Équipe Priorité Québec eliminated in City Council musical chairs

Local Journalism Initiative / / / , ,

Équipe Priorité Québec eliminated in City Council musical chairs

Peter Black, Local Journalism Initiative reporter

peterblack@qctonline.com

With the launch of the municipal election campaign just around the corner, there’s been another round of musical chairs involving familiar city councillors.

The two remaining councillors of Équipe Priorité Québec have jumped ship, each to a different party, effectively putting an end to the formation formerly known as Québec 21.

Stevens Melançon, the current leader of EPQ and councillor for the Chute-Montmorency– Seigneurial district, switched allegiances to Leadership Québec, the new party founded by mayoral candidate, former provincial Liberal cabinet minister and MNA for Louis-Hébert Sam Hamad.

Hamad and Melançon appeared together at an Aug. 13 media event at Golf Beauport to announce the joining of forces. Melançon’s move had been the subject of rumours ever since Hamad made it known he was considering a run for the mayor’s office last year.

Hamad said in a statement: “The arrival of Stevens and his team at Leadership Québec marks an important step in building a strong team, attentive to local communities and capable of delivering concrete results. Their pragmatic and respectful approach aligns perfectly with ours.”

For his part, Melançon, a councillor since the 2017 election, said, “By joining forces with Leadership Québec, our party has chosen to contribute to a broader, unifying movement rooted in the concrete concerns of citizens. We share common values: proximity to citizens, pragmatism and a desire to deliver results. Under the leadership of Sam Hamad, a man who listens, works on the ground, and delivers results, we will have the means to achieve more.”

Not all the EPQ “team” is joining with Hamad. Eric Ralph Mercier, a former leader of the party, may be joining another upstart party, Respect Citoyens. Although Mercier was on vaca- tion and could not be reached for comment, party leader Stephane Lachance confirmed in an interview with the QCT that Mercier would be running for Respect Citoyens in the des Monts district of Charlesbourg he has represented since 2021.

Mercier, son of longtime Charlesbourg mayor Ralph Mercier and a former Liberal MNA, was more cryptic in a statement issued last week. “It is with regret that I have decided to leave Équipe Priorité Québec in order to pursue my political commitment with a view to running again in the next election. I remain committed to serving the citizens of my district with integrity and conviction.”

Lachance, however, said Mercier would be making an announcement about joining Respect Citoyens soon, and the delay is out of consideration for the staff who work for ÉPQ, the second opposition party at City Hall.

Lachance, who owns a Lévis- based event organization business, is a former candidate for the Quebec Conservative Party in the riding of La Peltrie, which includes Shannon. He said Mercier shares the values of Respect Citoyens, particularly regarding the city’s finances.

Lachance is also strongly opposed to the city’s tramway project. “Our major project is to make the [Réseau de transport de la capitale] efficient and also that the people of Quebec will appreciate the service.

“This organization already has major problems,” Lachance said, without taking on a tramway system or rapid bus (SRB) network as proposed by Hamad.

Should Mercier run for Respect Citoyens, that would make 16 candidates already committed to running for the party.

It is not known whether Mercier will sit as an independent until the end of his term. If he does, ÉPQ will vanish from City Hall. The party, then called Québec 21 under leader and mayoral candidate Jean-François Gosselin, elected four councillors in 2021.

Gosselin, a strong opponent of the city’s tramway plan, joined the ruling party as an associate executive committee member responsible for sports and recreation. He is not running again.

The fourth Quebec 21 councillor, Bianca Dussault (Val-Bélair), joined Mayor Bruno Marchand’s Québec Forte et Fière (QFF) party at the same time and is running under that party’s banner.

The addition of Melançon brings the total number of Leadership Québec candidates to nine, including two recruits from Quebec d’abord, the successor to former mayor Régis Labeaume’s machine that ruled the city from 2009 until the 2021 election.

Isabelle Roy, councillor for the Beauport district of Robert-Giffard, and Louis Martin, who represents Cap-Rouge–Laurentien, jumped to Hamad’s party in the spring.

Québec d’abord is now down to only one incumbent councillor, besides party leader Claude Villeneuve. Patricia Boudreault- Bruyère, councillor for Neufchâtel-Lebourgneuf, announced last week she would not seek another term.

The sole incumbent running again for Québec d’abord is Véronique Dallaire in the Les Saules–Les Méandres district.

The party has found candidates for only three districts besides the Maizerets-Lairet district Villeneuve won in 2021.

As for QFF, it has candidates in all 21 districts, including seven incumbents. Mayor Bruno Marchand has said he will run in a district with a colistier or running mate. He has not said which district that would be, since all now have candidates for QFF.

In 2021, he ran in the Montcalm–Saint-Sacrement district, which the party won. Running mate Catherine Vallières-Roland became the councillor for the seat since Marchand had won the race for mayor.

Municipal elections take place all across Quebec on Nov. 2.

Équipe Priorité Québec eliminated in City Council musical chairs Read More »

Journalist Marianne White runs for Marchand team in St-Louis-Sillery

Local Journalism Initiative / / / , , , ,

Journalist Marianne White runs for Marchand team in Saint-Louis–Sillery

Peter Black, Local Journalism Initiative reporter

peterblack@qctonline.com

Veteran journalist Marianne White, most recently a senior editor at Le Journal de Québec, is leaping into municipal politics as the candidate for Mayor Bruno Marchand’s party in the Saint-Louis–Sillery seat.

White made the announcement on June 25 in front of the city library on Ave. Maguire, with nine other Québec Forte et Fière (QFF) candidates and the mayor at her side.

White, 47, will be seeking to succeed current QFF councillor Maude Mercier Larouche, the member of the executive committee responsible for transit, who announced she is not seeking a second term for family reasons.

In an interview with the QCT, White said she was very surprised she had been approached by QFF representatives about running for the party.

“We had lunch with two representatives of the party and when they pitched that to me, my jaw dropped, literally. I didn’t see myself doing that. But they made a really good pitch – and thinking back on it, I think they were right in the fact that I think I’m the right person to do this. I have what it takes to be there.”

White said, “They wanted to have someone who was from the community, and I‘ve been living here for six years. I think I could do that. I’m driven. I’m a good communicator.”

She told the party reps she would consider the proposal, and then she and her partner embarked on a planned three-week island-hopping vacation in Greece. “There couldn’t be a better place to reflect than Greece.”

After weighing the pros and cons, and keenly aware of the demands on politicians from having covered them as a journalist for many years, White decided to go for it.

“At the end of the day, what really drove my decision is I want to get more involved in my community. I want to be in a more active position … part of building the city for the future, for what we want to leave to the next generation.”

Upon her return, she handed in her resignation to Le Journal de Québec, where she had worked since 2012. Prior to Le Journal, White had worked in various French and English- language media for some 27 years after graduating from Université Laval with a communications degree.

In 2018, she wrote a book on Jean Lapierre, the politician and media commentator who died in a plane crash in 2016.

She has also written a foodie column, focusing on restaurants in the city.

White said she had no doubts that if she were to run, it would be for Marchand’s QFF. Part of that is the party’s commitment to the tramway project, which has relatively strong support in the Sillery district, according to polls.

“I think people are looking forward to this project going ahead. We’ve been talking about it for 20 or so years in Quebec,” White said.

“That’s not to say it’s going to be an easy project and there’s not going to be some problems when we try to put that into effect. There’s going to be roadwork and other inconveniences, but the job of the city is to try and make sure that this has the least impact on residents.”

White, whose father John White was a philosophy teacher at Cégep de Sainte-Foy, said her father encouraged her and her siblings to attend French school, and so, despite her anglo ancestry, she identifies as a francophone. Her precise English, however, has allowed her to work in English-language media.

She said she recognizes “there’s a vibrant English community in Quebec,” particularly in Sillery, and “people are proud of their roots.”

When the time came last week to step to the podium and announce her political baptism, White said, “It was fun, exhilarating even. I could say it was very different from what I’ve been doing for the past 27 years. I’ve been used to being on the other side of the podium for most of my life. But it’s a good thing. I think I’ve come to the conclusion that I wanted to do something different in my life and now, I think, is a good time to do it.”

The addition of White to the QFF team brings to 17 the total number of candidates the party has in place for the 21 districts.

Municipal elections will be held across Quebec on Nov. 2.

Journalist Marianne White runs for Marchand team in St-Louis-Sillery Read More »

Critics slam Hamad’s transit plan as obsolete

Local Journalism Initiative / / / , , , , ,

Critics slam Hamad’s transit plan as obsolete

Peter Black, Local Journalism Initiative reporter

peterblack@qctonline.com

Leadership Québec mayoral candidate Sam Hamad denies the coming election will be a referendum on the choice of transit system for the city.

Yet, given his vow to kill the current tramway system and replace it with one based on rapid bus service (SRB), transit is bound to be the central issue of the campaign.

A recent Segma poll showed Mayor Bruno Marchand leading Hamad by six points (38 per cent to 32 per cent) before Hamad released his transit plan last week. The poll also found nearly 30 per cent undecided, so the race for City Hall likely will be a battle to convince voters who has the better plan.

Hence, a day after Hamad unveiled his plan, Marchand delivered a harsh rebuke at a City Hall news conference. Marchand said Hamad’s proposal is “purely a political game. There are no facts, no science, no data to demonstrate that his project – without integration with a major axis – is relevant.”

Calling it a plan drawn up by “volunteers,” Marchand said it would do nothing to reduce the congestion problem in the most heavily populated corridor of the city, along Boul. René-Lévesque.

“We’re talking about Mr. Hamad’s feelings versus 20 years of studies, consultations, science and facts,” the mayor said.

“Do we want another election in Quebec City driven by nostalgia, a return to the past, the dream of 2015? I think the people of Quebec City are fed up,” Marchand said.

Opposition and Québec d’Abord Leader Claude Ville- neuve told reporters, “Who re- ally believes that Sam Hamad can deliver a mobility project? How many mobility projects have progressed in Quebec while Sam Hamad was minister of transport? How many in Quebec City? You know the answer: zero.”

Transition Québec Leader and Limoilou Coun. Jackie Smith said she “feels like [she’s] watching a bad comedy” with Hamad’s transit announcement.

“I don’t think what people want is to resume the debate where it was more than 10 years ago, when the idea Mr. Hamad is bringing back was rejected. The [CDPQ Infra] plan already includes the passage of an SRB on Boul. Charest; Mr. Hamad simply wants to start the plan backwards. The heart of the network congestion problem is on Parliament Hill and that’s what we’re tackling first with the deployment of the first phase of the tramway.”

Nora Loreto, co-founder and spokesperson for the pro- tramway citizens group Québec Désire Son Tramway, told the QCT Hamad’s proposal “shows that he’s got no clue about the growth of the city and the planned growth over the next 20 years. Seeing that he wants to push all the traffic onto Charest and leave the status quo in Upper Town is just not an option because at the end of the day the blockage for the traffic [stays] in Upper Town.”

Loreto said, “There’s a reason why all of the experts have not recommended this plan, and we think that it would be very prudent for Mr. Hamad, in an area where he is clearly lacking some knowledge and expertise, to listen to the experts on this one.”

Hamad’s plan did garner the support of Stevens Melançon, leader of Équipe Priorité Québec, who is reported to be considering joining Hamad’s team. He told Le Soleil, “I defend the citizen; I defend a project that respects the citizens’ ability to pay and that will serve my citizens.”

As for Marchand’s dismissal of Hamad’s plan, Melançon said, “I find it hard to understand why the mayor, whose project is not socially acceptable, is lecturing people.”

Critics slam Hamad’s transit plan as obsolete Read More »

Hamad recruits two sitting councillors for City Hall team

Local Journalism Initiative / / / , , , , , , , , , , ,

Hamad recruits two sitting councillors for City Hall team

Peter Black, Local Journalism Initiative reporter

peterblack@qctonline.com

Mayoral candidate Sam Hamad now has two sitting municipal councillors on his own slate of candidates.

Isabelle Roy, councillor for the Robert-Giffard district in Beauport, and Louis Martin, councillor for Cap-Rouge–Laurentien and former speaker of the city council, will run under Hamad’s Leadership Québec banner.

Both were councillors for the opposition Québec d’abord party, but in March leader Claude Villeneuve booted Roy from the caucus when reports surfaced she had talked to Hamad about joining his party. Martin, who had also had discussions with Hamad, quit the party on his own shortly afterwards.

As members of Québec d’abord, both councillors supported the tramway project, an initiative of the previous administration of Régis Labeaume. Hamad opposes the project in its current concept as a costly system citizens do not want.

Both councillors, when the QCT contacted them, offered explanations for the change of position. Roy said, “I don’t think I’ve been the biggest cheerleader for the tramway project in the last three years. The abandonment of the D’Estimauville branch of the tramway was the breaking point for my support.”

She said, “The citizens of Quebec deserve efficient mobility across the entire territory, and the project Mr. Hamad will be putting forward is a step in that very direction.”

Martin said, “I’ve always been in favour of improving public transit in the city. It does not matter what vehicle – tramway, subway, bus – we need more transit, quickly. I saw Mr. Hamad’s proposal and I am convinced that it’s the best project to improve public transit in the city, quickly, for all neighbourhoods, at a price we can afford.”

Martin said Hamad plans to unveil his alternative transit plan as early as this week.

As far as why she joined Hamad’s team, Roy said the former provincial Liberal MNA and minister “is an authentic leader, capable of bringing people together and moving major issues forward by rallying the right people around the table.”

The addition of Roy and Martin now gives Leadership Québec seven confirmed candidates so far for the 21 districts. Hamad does not plan to run for a council seat as some mayoral candidates have chosen to do.

Québec d’abord now has only two sitting councillors who plan to run again, Patricia Boudreault-Bruyère in Neufchâtel–Lebourgneuf and Véronique Dallaire in Saules–Les Méandres. Longtime councillor Anne Corriveau announced earlier this month she does not plan to run again in her Pointe- de-Sainte-Foy district.

Besides the two incumbents, the other Québec d’abord candidates are Rosie-Anne R. Vallières in Vanier-Duberger, a seat being vacated by Alicia Despins, and Sophie Gosselin in Lac-Saint-Charles–Saint-Émile. Villeneuve, who is running for mayor for the first time, is the councillor for Maizerets-Lairet.

The large field of mayoral candidates became even larger over the weekend when former City Hall opposition leader and mayoral candidate Anne Guérette announced she was running for mayor again under the banner of the newly created Parti du Monde – Équipe Anne Guérette. Since stepping down as leader of the now-defunct Démocratie Québec party in 2017, Guérette, an architect, has become a vocal opponent of the tramway project. She joins incumbent mayor Bruno Marchand, Villeneuve, Hamad, Transition Québec leader Jackie Smith and Respect Citoyens leader Stéphane Lachance on the lengthening list of candidates. Municipal elections will be held across Quebec on Nov. 2.

With files from Ruby Pratka, LJI reporter

Hamad recruits two sitting councillors for City Hall team Read More »

Geophysicist and bell-ringer Micha Horswill runs for Transition Québec

Local Journalism Initiative / / / , , ,

Geophysicist and bell-ringer Micha Horswill runs for Transition Québec

Peter Black, Local Journalism Initiative reporter

peterblack@qctonline.com

If being a geophysicist on city council wouldn’t be a first, Micha Horswill might well be the first church bell-ringer with a council seat, should she get elected in November.

Horswill, who on June 5 launched her campaign for the Cap-aux-Diamants council seat at a bar on Rue Saint-Jean, is a woman of many interests, now including municipal politics.

Her day job is as a research professional with Université Laval’s geophysical instrumentation group, but she still finds time to attend neighbourhood council meetings, make TikTok videos about “the city’s hidden gems,” and, yes, ring church bells.

As she explained in an interview prior to her launch party, friends had encouraged her to consider a city council run, which she initially rebuffed, but the idea “grew on me and I kept thinking about it and I said ‘why not?’ I was born here, I live here … and I have ideas. So, I decided to jump into the pool.”

Horswill, 31, said she only knew Transition Québec lead- er and Limoilou Coun. Jackie Smith from media reports, but she “loved” the social and environmental values of the party. She said the municipal politics bug took hold thanks to her experiences at neighbourhood council meetings.

One of those experiences was pushing for the creation of a mural on a side street off Rue Saint-Jean; the effort was a success and taught her a lot about how things get done in a city bureaucracy.

As she says on her Facebook page: “I’m in love with Quebec City–and I dream of it. I see it bigger, more vibrant, more avant-garde and more fair. I allow myself to dream, but I don’t just have my head in the clouds.

“I have my feet firmly planted, with my geophysicist’s perspective, which requires rigour, consistency and pragmatism. I’m trained to analyze complex systems, read between the layers and find the root causes of problems. I want to bring that perspective to the city as well.” Though her father is an anglophone from British Columbia who moved to Quebec City when he was young, Horswill was raised and educated in French. She said she learned her (fluent) English in school and perfected it in the years she worked in Europe, where “everything was in English.”

She recalls a high school rivalry with Quebec High School, but she said, “Now I’ve made peace with QHS and accepted that my basketball team wasn’t exactly the best.”

Her more recent interaction with the city’s anglophone community was with bell-ringers, a largely English-speaking group. She got involved about two years ago when she heard the bells being rung at the former St. Matthew’s Church on Rue Saint-Jean (now a public library, Bibliothèque Claire-Martin), was intrigued, and after some internet searching, found the change-ringing group and signed up.

“I discovered a nice community that is very vibrant,” she said. She was happy to participate when the city recently welcomed change-ringers from around the world.

“We’re the only city in Canada that has two bell-ringing towers,” Horswill said with some pride. The other bells are in the Anglican Cathedral of the Holy Trinity in the Old City, where she lives.

Horswill is proud of the his- tory of her city to the extent she highlights many aspects through brief videos on her TikTok channel. One of them features the top three libraries in the Old City, one of which is that of the Literary and Historical Society of Quebec at the Morrin Centre.

Horswill said it “pains her to see” not enough local residents live in the Old City. “It’s the birthplace of an entire nation. People should be living there, we should see children, neighbours.”

She said one measure to encourage people to live in the Old City would be to improve public transportation. “Having a walled city is great for tourists, but it keeps [residents] captive.”

Among other issues on her agenda are homelessness in the central city, the lack of trees in the Saint-Jean- Baptiste neighbourhood and the lack of a large grocery store for Old City residents.

Horswill said, “I think I will win,” although she does have competition in the form of Mélissa Coulombe-Leduc, the incumbent councillor from the ruling Québec Forte et Fière (QFF) party and member of the executive committee for heritage, planning, tourism and quality of life in the Old City.

QFF has announced candidates for all but two of the 21 council seats. Two notable additions to the party’s slate are Marchand’s media attachée Élainie Lepage, running in Saint-Roch–Saint-Sauveur, and Manouchka Blanchet, who was actually elected in 2021 in Beau- port’s Sainte-Thérèse-de-Lisieux district as the running mate of Jean-François Gosselin, the unsuccessful mayoral candidate for the now defunct Québec 21 party.

Sam Hamad’s Leadership Québec party added three more candidates to its slate last week: Mégy Gagné in Val-Bélair; Donald Gagnon in Louis-XIV and former Équipe Labeaume candidate Émilie Robitaille in Neufchâtel-Lebourgneuf.

Municipal elections are held across the province on Nov. 2.

Geophysicist and bell-ringer Micha Horswill runs for Transition Québec Read More »

Hamad announces first two candidates for City Hall campaign

Local Journalism Initiative / / / , , ,

Hamad announces first two candidates for City Hall campaign

Peter Black, Local Journalism Initiative reporter

peterblack@qctonline.com

Mayoral candidate Sam Hamad introduced the first two candidates for his Leadership Québec party, both of whom have backgrounds working within the provincial government.

At a news conference held in a crowded chauffeur’s cottage at Domaine Cataraqui on May 29, Hamad said Justine Savard and Jean-Stéphane Bernard “embody the strong, unifying leadership we want to offer the citizens of Quebec City. They each have an impressive track record, deep roots in their communities, and are ready to fully invest in improving the quality of life in their neighbourhoods.”

Savard, a lawyer who has worked in the office of Coalition Avenir Québec ministers Sonia LeBel and the late Nadine Girard, ran for the party in the 2022 election in the Montreal riding of Viau.

Savard will be running in the Beauport district of Sainte-Thérèse-de-Lisieux, a seat currently held by executive committee member and former mayoral candidate Jean-François Gosselin, who has announced he will not run again for city council.

Bernard, a CEGEP Champlain-St. Lawrence graduate who went on to earn degrees from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), the École nationale d’administration publique (ENAP) and Université Laval, is a former deputy minister of international relations and Canadian relations, who has also served as Quebec’s representative in Washington and New England.

Bernard will run in the Saint-Louis–Sillery district, currently held by executive committee member Maude Mercier Larouche, who has also said she is not running again.

Bernard, a resident of Sillery since he was a child, said the leap into politics is “just a continuity of what I’ve been doing for the last 30 years, working for the people of Quebec City, working for the people of the district that I wish to represent.”

In an interview with the QCT, he said he is “honoured, to be honest, to have this op- portunity to work with some- one who’s the leader that Quebec City needs.”

Savard, for her part, said she got back into elected politics at the municipal level, because “I’m a working mom and I’m really, really fond of my community and I saw a couple of things in the city that weren’t sitting well for me. So I decided that may- be with Sam Hamad we can change the course of things.”

Asked what she learned as a provincial candidate three years ago, Simard said, “I think I’m a better listener now,” having had the experience of knocking on doors to hear what citizens have to say.

During the news conference, neither candidate was willing to venture a specific opinion on the tramway project, whereas Hamad, who op- poses the plan, said he would release his party’s detailed platform “before the [summer] holidays.”

Hamad also responded to questions about the CAQ government’s “third link” bridge project, the location of which is supposed to be announced in June. He downplayed a comment he had made previously in favour of a bridge to the west near the current spans.

He said, “I will let the specialists decide technically where it should go, with acceptability and [the least] in- convenience” for the citizens of the city.

Hamad, incumbent mayor and Québec Forte et Fière Leader Bruno Marchand, Transition Québec Leader Jackie Smith and Québec d’abord Leader Claude Villeneuve are the declared candidates for city hall so far. Respect Citoyens Leader Stéphane Lachance has also said he plans to run for mayor, although recent reporting by Radio-Canada has cast doubt on whether he meets the residency requirement.

Municipal elections will be held across Quebec on Nov. 2.

Hamad announces first two candidates for City Hall campaign Read More »

Youngest councillor, St. Pat’s grad Alicia Despins leaving City Hall

Local Journalism Initiative / / / , , , ,

Youngest councillor, St. Pat’s grad Alicia Despins leaving City Hall

Peter Black, Local Journalism Initiative reporter

peterblack@qctonline.com

Stories abound of people leaving municipal politics for negative reasons. Then there’s the rare departure motivated by something positive. It’s what might be called an intermunicipal love story.

Coun. Alicia Despins (Vanier-Duberger) dropped a bombshell last week, announcing her decision to not seek a second term under the banner of Québec d’abord, the remnants of former mayor Régis Labeaume’s party.

Despins made the announcement via a news release on May 8, saying she “will not be seeking a third term, in order to begin a transition to a new chapter in my life focused on my studies and family projects.”

Despins, first elected in 2017 at age 23, was the youngest person ever elected to Quebec City council. On top of that distinction, Labeaume promptly named her to the executive committee with the culture portfolio.

In 2022, the Union of Quebec Municipalities awarded her the emerging leader award for her efforts in providing a role model for young people.

Despins is a graduate of St. Patrick’s High School, and also attended Holland School and St. Vincent School; her English education eligibility is courtesy of her father, a native of Ontario.

Although she had previously said she planned to run again in November, she recently made the decision to quit politics – at least temporarily. She plans to move in with her boyfriend, who lives in Val-d’Or, and start a family with him.

The boyfriend is Benjamin Turcotte, a first-term city councillor in Val-d’Or who also teaches literature at Cégep de l’Abitibi-Témiscamingue. The two met a year ago at the Union of Quebec Municipalities convention in Montreal. Since then, Despins said, they’ve been discussing ways to move forward with their long- distance relationship.

Then, she said, sparked by Turcotte’s opportunity to acquire a house near his parents in Val-d’Or, she came to the decision.

Speaking to the QCT while driving to Val-d’Or, Despins said, “A series of coincidences and other things all of a sudden made it clear that that’s what we have to do. We have to buy the house and move in together and start a family and [I’ll] finish my PhD. And it all happened very quickly. So I’m still kind of processing everything.”

She said, “I think it’s the right decision for me right now. I’ve been in elected politics for eight years now, and I also feel the need to maybe have a less stressful life.”

While she’s been a councillor for nearly two terms – she plans to finish out her second mandate – Despins has been involved in politics since her teens. While a student at CEGEP, she took part in the 2012 student protests against tuition hikes. She later formed a municipal political party with fellow students called Alternative Québec.

After working in the of- fice of former Quebec Liberal education minister Sébastien Proulx, she made the leap into municipal politics in 2017 with Équipe Labeaume in the Vanier-Duberger district, winning the seat with 57 per cent of the vote, the highest margin of the 21 winning councillors.

Despins said her proudest moment of her time at City Hall was being named to the culture portfolio. “I did not expect that in 2017, at 23 [years of age]. That was the proudest moment and then everything that hap- pened from then on.”

In Labeaume’s recently re- leased memoir, Le Code Labeaume (see review in this edition), Despins recalled, “When Régis met with me to announce it, he explained that he wanted to make room for young people, that he thought it was important to have women in politics and that he wanted to entrust me with real responsibilities. He also told me, ‘You’re going to have to deliver.’ It wasn’t complacent at all. It was an exceptional opportunity he of- fered me, but it wasn’t handed to me on a silver platter.”

Asked whether she thought she had met her mentor’s expectations, Despins said, “I think I did – and also he told me I did – so that was important for me.”

Once established in Val-d’Or, Despins plans to complete her PhD thesis on the international relationships of cities, a topic she says has heightened relevance currently with the American tariff war.

As she completes her term at City Hall, Despins said, “I’m going to enjoy every day because I don’t know if it will ever come again; being proud of representing people. I see the end coming with lots of feelings mixed together.”

With the departure of Despins, Québec d’abord, the official opposition party at City Hall, now has only three incumbent candidates running again, besides leader and mayoral candidate Claude Villeneuve.

In a news release, Villeneuve said of Despins, “While her departure saddens me, I respect and understand her decision. Politics is an intense profession. Alicia has always done her job well, and I learned a tremendous amount from working with her. It has been a privilege to work with her over the past few years.”

Municipal elections will be held Nov. 2.

Youngest councillor, St. Pat’s grad Alicia Despins leaving City Hall Read More »

Jackie Smith enters mayoral race for Transition Québec

Local Journalism Initiative / / / , , , , ,

Jackie Smith enters mayoral race for Transition Québec

Ruby Pratka, Local Journalism Initiative reporter

editor@qctonline.com

Limoilou Coun. Jackie Smith and the Transition Québec party she leads have officially jumped into the mayoral race. The party held a launch event on May 10 at Le Bivouac in Limoilou, which was also broadcast on Facebook Live.

Speaking to an enthusiastic crowd, Smith said she planned to run for mayor in 2025 and keep pushing her party’s progressive platform.

She looked back on the 2021 election, where she came third in the mayoral race but won her Limoilou council seat. “I felt so proud and lucky – not only to be elected as the only woman to lead a party, and to represent Transition Québec, but my God, we worked hard … we proposed bold ideas and bold citizens pushed us forward. These are shared victories.”

Among the “shared victories,” she counted the inauguration of Place Karim-Ouellet in Saint-Jean-Baptiste, a tax on abandoned buildings, a tax on motor vehicle registration to fund mass transit, two new bike paths and a subsidy program for eco-friendly menstrual products and diapers. “It makes women’s lives easier and it keeps waste from going to the incinerator – it’s a feminist, ecologist policy that clearly has the Transition Québec stamp on it, so thank you for that!

“There are people who say ‘Your policies are a bit nutty,’ but the number of times people have said it’s impossible and then it becomes possible … I don’t give up,” she said, referencing the transformation of disused city offices in Saint-Roch into the Répit Basse-Ville warming centre for homeless people, which the party championed.

Speaking over Mother’s Day weekend, in a crowded restaurant where laughing children and crying babies could be heard over the din, the mother of two young children said it was “very difficult” to balance raising children and being a politician. “There are very few women of childbearing age who are in politics … and at City Council, at public consultations, who do we hear from? From men, and sometimes from women who don’t have kids. They are the ones we listen to. But that doesn’t mean women [with children] have nothing to say. Speaking with moms at the park, those are the real public consultations – why has this bench been broken for three years? Where are our kids supposed to pee if there’s no washroom in the park?

“We’re facing a lot of challenges, and there is a whole transition that came with the pandemic that we are just now getting out of, questions about democracy, supply chains, and the climate that hasn’t stopped changing. But we will be equal to the challenge, because we know where we are, we know where we’re going and we’re resilient,” she said.

Transition Québec has announced three council candidates in the past week in addition to Smith – activist and Maizerets neighbourhood councillor Martial Van Neste in Maizerets–Lairet, Camille Lambert-Deubelbeiss in Robert-Giffard and Espérance Mfisimana as Smith’s running mate in Limoilou.

Mfisimana was born in Burundi and arrived in Quebec City as a refugee in 1993. She now works in human resources. Like Smith, she’s the mother of young children. She spoke about the importance of making working-class and racialized people feel more represented by the political system. As Smith’s running mate, Mfisimana would take her seat as councillor for Limoilou in the event Smith be- comes mayor. If this happens, she would be the first Black woman, and only the second Black person, to serve on city council. “I mistakenly believed for a long time that politics was something for the elite,” she said. “I think politicians do try hard to represent working- class and minority citizens, but we don’t see those citizens. I don’t see many people like me on city council, and even fewer racialized women in [decision-making] roles. I hope I can be an inspiration for women from minority groups to run for office,” she said.

Jackie Smith enters mayoral race for Transition Québec Read More »

Former Quebec Liberal cabinet minister Sam Hamad runs for mayor

Local Journalism Initiative / / / , , , ,

Former Quebec Liberal cabinet minister Sam Hamad runs for mayor

Peter Black, Local Journalism Initiative reporter

peterblack@qctonline.com

It’s official. After months of speculation and a certain amount of teasing, Sam Hamad has entered the race for mayor of Quebec City.

The 67-year-old former provincial Liberal cabinet minister and MNA for Louis-Hébert made the announcement April 6 in front of an enthusiastic crowd of some 300 supporters packed into the Salle du Quai du Cap-Blanc meeting hall.

The site for the announcement, on Boul. Champlain, was a particularly symbolic one for Hamad, who said in his 15-minute speech that the creation of the three phases of the Promenade Champlain project was his proudest achievement.

Hamad, introduced by two Cégep de Ste-Foy students and his two sons, Jean-Simon and Louis-Joseph, said, “As you know, I left politics in 2017, but in reality, politics has never left me. Since then, I have found a quality of life, a rewarding job and precious time with my loved ones. It’s true, I have everything to lead a happy life, but I have always had the need to serve my community.”

Hamad was born in Syria and came to Canada in 1978 to study engineering. “I arrived in Quebec alone. Very young. All I had were two suitcases, but big dreams. This city welcomed me, it offered me exceptional opportunities and today, I feel more than ever a duty to give back to this city that has given me so much.”

Under the banner of a new party called Leadership Québec, Hamad said he is “running so that Quebec [City] can regain its momentum. So that it can start dreaming big again. So that we can finally emerge from the uncertainty, the division and the stagnation.”

First elected in Louis-Hébert in 2003, Hamad was a minister in a string of portfolios under Jean Charest and Philippe Couillard, including natural resources, labour, treasury board, economic development and transport, as well as minister for the capital region.

Besides the Promenade Champlain redevelopment, Hamad said he had “delivered the merchandise” for other major city projects, including the PEPS at Université Laval, the Videotron Centre, the expansion of the Musée national des beaux-arts du Québec and the Hôpital de l’Enfant-Jésus.

Hamad noted his collaboration with former mayors Jean-Paul L’Allier and Régis Labeaume, former PQ minister and MNA for the downtown riding of Taschereau Agnès Maltais, Conservative MP Gérard Deltell and federal ministers and premiers from all parties.

“What has always guided me is working together in the best interests of the citizens of Quebec,” he said.

Hamad unveiled a five-point program at the launch: “Bring back strong, mobilizing leadership to Quebec City; put citizens back at the heart of municipal decisions; revive Quebec City’s economy with ambition and boldness; uphold its status as the national capital; and manage public finances responsibly, respecting taxpayers’ ability to pay.” As for his position on the current tramway project, Ha- mad said he would be laying out a detailed plan that serves both the downtown and the suburbs during the campaign. He has stated previously the tramway in its current form is too expensive. He told the QCT, “I will come back with this. It’s 210 days [in the campaign], so we have enough time to explain exactly what the project is, what we need.”

As for candidates for Leadership Québec, Hamad said, “I’ll launch with a solid team, rooted in the reality on the ground. We won’t campaign against an administration or another party. We’ll campaign for the citizens of Quebec. We want to rally all those who believe that Quebec can do better.”

Attendees the QCT spoke to cited Hamad’s experience as the main reason for support- ing him, as well as uncertainty about the tramway project.

One supporter was even more specific. Francine DeBlois, active in a Saint-Jean-Baptiste neighbourhood citizens group, said, “Hamad is a man who listens to us, which is not the case with the current mayor.” She said her group had gone to a city council meeting to raise concerns, but “it was always the same cassette. Everything was already decided.”

Besides Hamad, the other declared mayoral candidates are incumbent mayor Bruno Marchand of Quebec Forte et Fière, Claude Villeneuve of Quebec d’abord, Jackie Smith of Transition Québec and Stéphane Lachance of Parti Respect Citoyens.

Municipal elections in Quebec take place on Nov. 2.

Former Quebec Liberal cabinet minister Sam Hamad runs for mayor Read More »

Possible mayoral candidate Hamad slams cost of tramway

Local Journalism Initiative / / / , , , ,

Possible mayoral candidate Hamad slams cost of tramway

Peter Black, Local Journalism Initiative reporter

peterblack@qctonline.com

He’s not yet officially in the race for mayor of Quebec City, but former Quebec Liberal cabinet minister Sam Hamad appears to be staking his campaign on killing the tramway project.

Hamad’s concerns about the cost and nature of the mega-project are well known. In August, as reports surfaced of his interest in a bid for mayor, Hamad told the QCT, “There is a lot of missing data, so I can’t judge it. How much is it going to cost citizens? Nobody knows that.”

Now, in a Radio-Canada report, Hamad has declared himself ready to fight for an alternative. He said, “We have completely lost control of this project. I will propose a vision of mobility that respects the ability of Quebec citizens to pay.”

As of last week, Hamad has yet to set a date for the anticipated launch of his campaign.

His stance against the tramway, however, may have cost him a potential candidate. Isabelle Roy, the councillor for Québec d’abord in the Robert-Giffard district, had been booted from the party caucus by leader Claude Villeneuve for having had discussions with Hamad about possibly running for a party he would form.

Roy, who now sits as an independent, had told the QCT she is keeping her options open regarding the next election, and not ruling out running on a Hamad ticket.

In the wake of Hamad taking a public stand against the tramway, though, Roy may avoid hopping on board his possible campaign. In a message to the QCT, Roy said, “Quebec [City] needs a structuring transport network. It needs to be done! For four years, we’ve been going around in circles, and the project isn’t moving forward. We need to get a project off the ground!”

A “structuring transport network” is assumed to mean a system of light rail cars running on tracks.

Another former Québec d’abord councillor, now sit- ting as an independent, is taking more of a wait-and-see stance regarding Hamad and the tramway. Louis Martin, who represents the Cap-Rouge–Laurentien district, told the QCT in a message, “I haven’t seen any official statements from Mr. Hamad on the tramway, so I can’t comment on that.” Martin is a first-term councillor, having won the seat vacated by Marie-Josée Savard, former mayor Régis Labeaume’s hand- picked successor for mayor leading the party he created. Savard, who chose not to have a running mate in her district, lost the 2021 mayoral race by a slim margin to current mayor Bruno Marchand, head of Québec Forte et Fière.

Martin left Québec d’abord last week following what he told the media were “decisions and directions taken by Québec d’abord in recent months, with which I was less comfortable. Preparations for the election campaign are progressing. I found it more elegant to withdraw before all the decisions, platforms and directions were made.”

With the departure of Martin and Roy, Québec d’abord is left with five councillors, including leader and mayoral candidate Claude Villeneuve. In the 2021 election, Savard’s team won 10 of the 21 council seats. Since then, three councillors defected to the governing QFF caucus.

Hamad approached Roy and Martin directly about running for his party should he decide to run for mayor. In a telephone interview with the QCT, Roy said she met with Hamad for a cof- fee at his invitation. She said, although she does not know how, Hamad had heard she was having misgivings about Québec d’abord.

“I was drifting apart” from the party, she said. “I was considering many things. I love my colleagues and I respect them. It has nothing to do with them.”

Roy said, “I’m very, very comfortable being an independent right now.”

Of Québec d’abord’s four remaining councillors, only Alicia Despins (Vanier-Duberger) has officially declared she is run- ning again for the party. As of this writing, Anne Corriveau, Véronique Dallaire and Patricia Boudreault-Bruyère had not stated their intention to seek another term.

Possible mayoral candidate Hamad slams cost of tramway Read More »

Sam Hamad recruiting candidates for City Hall campaign

Local Journalism Initiative / / / , , , ,

Sam Hamad recruiting candidates for City Hall campaign

Peter Black, Local Journalism Initiative reporter

peterblack@qctonline.com

An effort to “poach” a candidate from another party is providing more proof former Liberal cabinet minister Sam Hamad is preparing to launch a campaign for the municipal election in November.

Last week, Québec D’abord, the official opposition at City Hall, announced via news release the expulsion of Isa- belle Roy, one of the party’s seven councillors, when it was learned Roy “was in discus- sions with Sam Hamad to run as a municipal councillor on his team.”

Leader and mayoral candidate Claude Villeneuve said in the release, “This situation is causing a breakdown in the bond of trust between Ms. Roy and Québec D’abord. As a re- sult, I have made the decision, with the support of our caucus, to exclude Ms. Roy from our team.”

According to a source familiar with the situation the QCT contacted, Villeneuve became aware of Hamad’s overtures to Roy when a journalist who had learned of the “discussions” called him to get his reaction. Villeneuve then called Roy to confirm her conversation with Hamad.

Roy was on vacation with her family during March Break last week; she told the QCT in a message that she was not ready to comment on the situation. She has represented the Robert-Giffard district since her election in 2021 under the banner of Marie-Josée Savard, the designated successor of longtime mayor Régis Labeaume, who narrowly lost that year’s mayoral race.

Before running for council, Roy had a long career in event organization, including the 400th anniversary celebrations of Quebec City in 2008.

Quebec’s director of elections, meanwhile, has con- firmed it has received a request to reserve the name of a new party, called Leadership Québec, in the name of temporary leader André Simard.

Simard confirmed to Radio- Canada the request had been submitted with the list of at least 100 prospective party members, the names of two leaders and an official representative.

Simard, who ran Hamad’s provincial election campaigns, said, “I won’t hide from you that we would like Sam to launch in the coming weeks, so we are preparing the ground.”

The party name – which could be adapted to include Hamad’s name – has not yet been posted on the Elections Québec website.

In a related development, the Journal de Québec reported last week that two internet domain names had been reserved: samhamad.ca and equipesamhamad.ca. When accessed, both sites are said to be “under construction.”

Reached at his office for comment, Hamad told the QCT he’d “call back later.”

Hamad, 67, was the Liberal MNA for the Quebec City riding of Louis-Hébert from 2003 to 2017. Hamad was a minister in several portfolios in the governments of Jean Charest and Philippe Couillard, including minister of transport and minister responsible for the Quebec capital region. He resigned from cabinet and left politics in April 2017.

Mayor Bruno Marchand said in media reports he was “very eager” for Hamad to jump in the race. He told the Journal de Québec, “It’s about time. It’s been a long time. It’s the longest striptease in history. I can’t wait. He’s been telling everyone for months that he’s going to do it.”

Marchand said a Hamad administration would be “a step backward.”

Sam Hamad recruiting candidates for City Hall campaign Read More »

Scroll to Top