Council protests proposed merger of municipal, school board elections

A resolution passed by city council last Monday evening, and subsequently forwarded to Liberal Education Minister Michelle Courchesne who is exploring the plan, and Municipal Affairs Minister Nathalie Normandeau, notes that school board elections are currently conducted with separate English and French voters' lists, "which would create confusion at the polling stations."

The resolution asks the government to abandon merging municipal and school board elections, "considering the numerous problems and significant delays having surfaced at the polling stations during the 2005 municipal elections, and considering that the candidates and issues involved at election time deserve no less attention at the school board level than at the municipal level, and considering that it would prove to be unfair for candidates, as much as for voters, to merge two election procedures that are so different." "The reason the government chose to do this is that they feel the level of participation at the school board elections is so low; they thought if they put the two together it would increase the participation," said Mayor Karin Marks. "There are, however, a lot of people who are concerned that it will muddy the waters and that having posters up for municipal candidates and posters up for school board candidates is going to confuse people." "I am very saddened by the lack of participation in the school board elections, but I don't think this is the solution, and I think this will confuse people even more," said Councillor Cynthia Lulham. "I do urge them to look at the school board elections and the whole process to see if there is a better way they can do that and get more people involved." "They're looking at the symptom and not the real problem behind it," said Councillor Tom Thompson, the resolution's sponsor. "Our city clerk knows all things can go wrong in any given election. I have my fingers crossed that things will go well. Imagine mixing these together. I really don't feel confident at this time that this should be done."

Bill 88, which contains the proposed electoral changes, could end up being delayed indefinitely if Premier Jean Charest follows through on warnings he's been making to the opposition in the National Assembly and calls an election. "It's going to become an election issue," said Mike Cohen, a spokesman for the English Montreal School Board and a member of Côte St. Luc city council, which was one of the first municipalities to pass a resolution protesting the merging of elections.