Villeneuve blasts ‘frivolous’ spending on covered rinks

Peter Black, Local Journalism Initiative reporter

peterblack@qctonline.com

The Official Opposition leader at City Hall is criticizing Mayor Bruno Marchand’s administration for tapping into a climate change reserve fund to build refrigerated skating rinks.

The budget earmarks $45 million from the fund to build the rinks, as well as a project to prevent flooding on the Lorette River.

Coun. Claude Villeneuve, leader of Québec d’Abord, said in a post-budget meeting with reporters, “We are using the climate reserve [fund] for leisure investments. It seems frivolous to us. It is cynical. It is populist. It is using funds that we have to deal with an emergency.”

Limoilou councillor and Transition Québec Leader Jackie Smith also gave the thumbs-down to the use of the climate funds to build a rink. She said she was “really disappointed that we’re going to withdraw money to use the climate fund for skating rinks. From the beginning, I was skeptical about this fund because it wasn’t well put together when it was announced.”

Marchand defended the expenditure on the rinks, which would extend the skating season from October to May, as a concrete adaptation to climate change.

“We can’t wait until 2028, 2030, 2032 to say, ‘Well, we will have a well-stocked fund, but in the meantime, we will have experienced negative effects. So, we want to accelerate change.”

Patrick Paquet, leader of the other opposition party, Équipe Priorité Québec, attacked the city’s finances, saying without the increase in vehicle registration fees bringing $18 million, the “real tax increase” would be 5.4 per cent, not 2.9 per cent.