Demerged mayors boycott Agglom Council

The decision came after the tabling of the 2007 agglomeration budget, which the

suburban mayors say raises taxes for their cities, while holding them steady and in some cases decreasing them for Montreal’s

boroughs.

After boycotting last Thursday morning’s Agglomeration Council meeting, held to appoint members to a budget review committee, the mayors returned to Montreal city hall in the late afternoon, prior to a regular agglomeration meeting, to hold a press

conference.

“The Quebec government has created a structure that we consider to be unfair and unjust and yesterday’s budget—which shocked us all—has once again proved that the executive committee has the ability to abuse their power and to exercise a conflict of interest in transferring the increase in

budget, the increase in taxes to our residents in order to fulfill their promises to the Montreal residents,� said Karin Marks, Westmount mayor and president of the Association of Suburban Municipalities.

Montreal West Mayor Campbell Stuart projected that his residents will face additional taxes of about $148,000 and Côte St. Luc Mayor Anthony Housefather said his residents are facing an increase of about $732,000.

This rise was unexpected to Housefather because, he said, “Our evaluation increase is only 36.9 per cent when Montreal’s is an average of 48 per cent, so where we should have seen a two per cent decrease we get a four per cent increase for 2007.�

Stuart was also projecting a four per cent increase to residents. The demerged towns calculated their own figures comparing the 2006 budget to the 2007 one, as Montreal did not make comparative figures available.

While the tax increase displeased the

suburban mayors, the real issue with the new agglomeration budget was the fact that it

represented definitive proof to them, that they are dealing with a faulty structure of government.

“The minister has continually said you need to cooperate and it’s a question of communication,� said Marks. “When we saw yesterday how they were able to manipulate the budget for the second time doing the same thing to our residents, it is abundantly clear that it is not a question of goodwill: the structure is such that it will enable them to do that and they will continue to do that.�

Marks also said that there is a clear conflict of interest in how the Agglomeration Council is run. “Mr. Zampino has said that he will continue to do what is in the best interest of his electors, but he sits there as the executive committee member on the Agglomeration and we are not able to make those changes, so who’s speaking for our citizens?� asked Marks.

“When (Montreal) councillors are there, they’ve already received orientation and nothing can change,� said Marks. “Why are they there... we can’t change their votes even if it’s a proposal that could be interesting to them?�

Marks said that they will need to hear

proposals for the minister before they return to the Agglomeration Council.

“We’ve done this for a year; we’ve really played the good soldiers, we’ve participated, now we can honestly say with all the effort we’ve put in, it doesn’t work,� said Marks. “We’re still being taken advantage of, more importantly, our citizens are being taken advantage of.�

The demerged mayors say that the onus is on the provincial government to a correct a flawed system of their design.

“It’s a system that’s designed to allow Montreal to cheat, and so Montreal cheats, so the people who designed the system have to change it,� said Stuart. “The government has to change it.�

Mayor Housefather feels that the impact of the taxes could manifest itself and the agglomeration system could have an effect when the next provincial election is held. “They should have had a tax decrease and they’re having an increase and I don’t think people across the island in our communities who elect seven or eight MNAs are going to be happy about it,� he said.

While the boycott of agglomeration proceedings goes on, the members of the ASM will continue to send budgetary bylaw appeals, where necessary, to the minister in the two areas they are allowed: bylaws dealing with the budget itself and bylaws dealing with the mill rate.

“The rates will be appealed just like they were last year and we were successful in part in appealing the rates last year,� said Housefather. “Certainly we’re not going to sit back and let things go by that we can appeal to the minister.�