Régent Millette, David S. Rovins and Andrew Wattie have run in elections before. Wattie, who bills himself as an independent, also claims on his campaign posters to be affiliated with a political organization known as the Conservation Party.

Rovins, although he currently lives in the town of Ste. Adèle north of Montreal, was raised on Ramezay Road just outside Westmount. "Our driveway was in Westmount," he told the Examiner. "Our house was actually in Montreal." His grandfather father built a house on Lexington Avenue.

Rovins, who says he has been active in politics for the past 39 years, has run in municipal, provincial and federal elections. While almost always running as an independent, he ran once for the NDP. One of his principle motivations has been to have the director general of elections do away with the $1,000 deposit for running in federal elections.

"If you run as an independent you run to present ideas," he said. "I really believe in democracy. I can afford $1,000, but a poor person has every equal right to present themselves as I do." Other issues Rovins is raising include the "massive influence of money" on democracy, and "the power of the media which can distort."

Of all the elections in which Rovins has been a candidate, he has won only once. "I was actually vice-president of the McGill Student Society and president," he said. Over the past 25 years, he has made numerous attempts to win a seat on Ste. Adèle town council, but so far to no avail.

Wattie, a retired draftsman and independent scholar from Montreal's east end, is a running enthusiast and a vegetarian whose concerns include sound environmental practices. In an interview, he referred to the Conservation Party as "just an idea." If he were to be elected, he would actually organize it.

He ran once before as an independent in a 1985 provincial election in Mount Royal. His current program focuses more on global problems, rather than local needs. He sees human overpopulation as the planet's number one threat. The solution he proposes involves a method through which one of every 50 people in an extended family would be chosen to represent the group's genes.

"The world would be broken up into 20 naturally frontiered regions, each with its capital and with the island of Cyprus as the world's capital," he says. "This program would advance through diplomatic negotiations with the present geo-political governments over a half century period, and the peace of nature's balance would be restored."

Asked where he gets his ideas, Wattie replied, "From my studies of history."

Millette could not be reached by deadline. However, records of past provincial elections indicate that he was a independent candidate in a 2006 by-election in the Montreal riding of Pointe-aux-Trembles. Out of a field of eight, he came in last with 31 votes.