New Hydro director looks to the future

The electric power utility's most recent director, Marc Roy, resigned in July after spending 10 years in charge of the Glen power house. Roy, who started at Westmount Hydro as a short-term consultant, became head of the utility after the previous director, Danny Ponzo, took ill and died. Roy is remaining until the end of his mandate on Dec. 31, after which Dubé will take over.

Dubé told The Examiner he plans to continue improvements to Westmount's electrical system started by his predecessors.

"The five-kilovolt structure is very good," he said, describing one of the key elements of the City's electric infrastructure.

He added that he might be taking a closer look at electric power issues that are especially crucial, such as lightning strikes and the large number of trees that grow all over Westmount.

Dubé, who spent much of his career working with wired systems located underground, suggested that he could also be investigating the possibility of converting Westmount's mostly above-ground electric grid to one beneath the ground's surface.

"I know it's more expensive, but we could maybe find some ways to make it cheaper," he said. "With my experience, it could be a nice challenge."

Commenting on Dubé's hiring, Councillor Patrick Martin, the Commissioner of Utilities on council, noted that Roy's initial 10-week consultant's contract ended up stretching out a decade. "During that time he brought an amazing amount of technical expertise and re-jigging of the organization and has done a fantastic job," he said.

"He has elected after 10 years to say, 'You know what, I've done it and I want to do something else now.' And so he insists, 'I'm not retiring.' He intends to go on to do other interesting things after Westmount." Martin said the City went through a recruiting process, which was carried out according to policy regarding the hiring of management personnel.

The process was coordinated by a selection committee that was comprised of Martin, Mayor Karin Marks, the City's director for human resources, Alan Kulaga, and Bruce St. Louis, the director-general. Career opportunity notices were posted on Westmount's web site, in public places and in various publications.

The ads attracted 13 serious applications, of which five were selected for a first round of interviews. That short list was then reduced to two for a second round of interviews, and both candidates were put through rigorous analysis which was completed in mid-October.

"It was really quite an interesting exercise for all of us, including the candidates, I think," said Martin, adding that the selection committee was unanimous in their recommendation that Dubé be hired.

Dubé spent part of his career with Bell Canada as a manager responsible for above and underground infrastructure planning and maintenance. He also worked for the Commission des Services Électriques de la Ville de Montréal, where he rose to the position of division chief for the management of research and development projects.

Roy is the third head of a City of Westmount department to step down in more than a year. Besides Hydro Westmount, vacancies in the Public Security and Public Works departments have now been filled. Before he was director of Hydro Westmount, Roy was a consultant specializing in manufactured electrical products and he expects to return to that field.