Welcome to Parti montarvillois

ELECTORAL PLATFORM

OUR THREE TOP PRIORITIES

1.Municipal finances

a. Freeze operating expenses for 2010.

b. Implement productivity gains of 10% per year for the period 2011-2013.

c. Reduce the debt to revenue ratio by 10%.

d. Have an average property tax at least 5% below the average of that for towns in the greater Montreal area with over 20 000 inhabitants.

2. Agglomeration with Longueuil and our regional presence

a. Restore a dialogue in order to defend our interests and to put an end to confrontation.

b. Undertake negotiations to reinstate St-Bruno’s pre-2002 status using the method employed by the municipality of Bromont.

c. Deliver a proposed settlement to the Minister of Municipal Affairs in collaboration with all parties concerned by the latest March 31st, 2012.

3. Economic development of our territory

a. Approach based on the principles of sustainable development.

b. Review the Urban Development Plan, more specifically the protection of our green spaces and quality of life.

c. Enhance St-Bruno’s agricultural sector in conjunction with the relevant authorities.

d. Revitalize the town center by enhancing its village-like character.

OUR COMMITMENTS FOR 2010 AND 2011

An open-door administration accessible to all citizens

• An ethical code of conduct for elected officials and municipal employees – 2010

• A monthly citizens assembly, in addition to the statutory council meeting – 2010

• A complete inventory (physical, social and economic) of our territory during 2010 and 2011 carried out in concert with citizens and all social and economic partners active in St- Bruno, to enable proper planning for the future.

To the English speaking community of St-Bruno,

Since I started going door to door, some of you have kindly written in with comments and questions regarding our policies and platform. I thought it would be beneficial to all to publish my reply to these questions on our website for all to read.

You raise some very pertinent questions, and I will attempt to address these issues below. You obviously have a much longer history in St-Bruno than I do, but sometimes it is useful to get an outsider’s view of things. My wife and I, too, chose St-Bruno for its charm and of course the natural surroundings, but without having done much in the way of research into the history of the town. I was pleasantly surprised to learn of the contribution made by the English community to not only the development of, but mostly the conservation of the town. The evidence is everywhere, most notably the National Park that is the jewel of St-Bruno. It is a fantastic place to live and to raise one’s children. But many native Montarvillois do not seem to realise this fact. They seem content to let things slide, and for ruthless development to swallow up all the remaining green space, to be replaced by more concrete.

After having only been living here for three years, I have noticed significant changes, mostly for the worse (Le Manoir, and the condos south of route 116 opposite boul. Boucherville, for example). Urban development is my main concern, and St-Bruno seems to be going in the direction of Brossard and St-Hubert, whereby every available open space is targeted for development. Mr. Benjamin is proud of his urban development plan that dates back to the 80s and 90s. He doesn’t seem to understand that the world has moved on, and his plan is completely outdated. At the current rate things are going, when my children are grown and old enough to appreciate the town, it will have changed beyond recognition.

You are by no means the first to mention to me that the citizens have no voice at town hall anymore. The best we get is lip service, and are sometimes just treated plain rudely. However, I did not realise he doesn’t care for the English community. Perhaps he sees them in the same light as dog-owners : second class citizens that deserve a dog park directly beneath the most enormous power lines in existence, when there is still a reasonable doubt as to the health effects of these lines.

That would be bad enough as it is, but that is not all. Mr Benjamin’s arrogance and confrontational attitude has left St-Bruno in a very, very weak position regionally speaking. We have burned all our bridges now : Longueuil doesn’t want anything to do with us, the surrounding towns of the MRC Vallee du Richelieu neither, and so on ; even Mr. Charest is fed up, after all the pointless letters he was sent by Mr. Benjamin. Wherever we look, it is the same story.

Just to put icing on the cake, after some searching through financial records from the last 4 years of the town’s operations, we are seeing a huge mismanagement of public funds. This administration has increased the public debt from $14,5M at the end of 2005 to $26,9M at the end of 2008, i.e. an 86% increase in only three years ! And this does not include data from the current year, so it will be even worse now. Meanwhile they have cut the municipal tax rate, resulting in a $1 million reduction in revenues, and this is of course a blatant attempt to buy votes for the up-coming elections.

It is for these reasons, among others, that I decided to take a stand and to try to put a stop to this. I truly believe that Mr. Murray has nothing but the best intentions for the people of St-Bruno, be they English, dog-owners, or whatever. He is a genuine guy, very easy to talk to, and with a genuine vision for the future of St-Bruno that we all share, one based on sustainable development, where “Think global, act local” is the basis for all our actions. You don’t have to look very far to see how far behind we have fallen in terms of reducing our impact of the environment, on which we ultimately depend.

So, how do we get out of this mess ? It is going to be a hard slog, but these are the steps we will take initially :

1) Start listening to the people again. We must not forget that our primary responsibility is to serve the citizens of St-Bruno. And to properly serve them, we need to firstly listen to them. We intend to have a second monthly meeting (in addition to the statutory council meeting) that will be less formal and more of a friendly dialogue between the council members and the citizens, where any subject or concern can be raised and discussed in a relaxed atmosphere.

2) We need to urgently re-build all the broken ties with our neighbours. This will be slow work, but our approach will be one of cooperation and not confrontation. Especially urgent is the Agglomeration de Longueuil that you mention is an unsatisfactory situation. Realistically, considering that the provincial Liberals created the Agglo. and that St-Bruno is persona non grata at the MRC Richelieu Valley ; we are stuck in the current arrangement for the next few years. But instead of boycotting the Agglo council, as is the current practice, we will sit down with them and negotiate a better deal of services for the 53 cents of every tax dollar we send to them. Right now we have NO SAY in how our tax dollars are being spent, and I am sure we can do much better.

3) All decisions that will be taken by us will be based on principles of sustainable development. More specifically, we will be subscribing to the Local Agenda 21, details of which were revealed at the UN Earth Summit in Rio in 1992. This is something that we believe very strongly in. We are not a green party, but you only have to look at our logo to realise where and in what order our priorities lie (the citizen, then the environment). Here we will tackle issues such as urban sprawl and over-development and find ways to slow down future development, or at least develop with the above principles at the heart of any project. There are plenty of examples around the world where development can actually bring something good to the community, but it takes a bit of imagination and audacity to implement such projects. I believe that we have what it takes, and that the good citizens of St-Bruno will be behind us in this.

We will be making our policy platform public in the near future, for strategic reasons we are not doing so just yet. I know that the voter turn-out is low for municipal elections, and that is why we are going to do things a bit differently, so as to get people interested again. If turn-out is over 50%, we have a good chance of getting in, and voter apathy is our greatest enemy.

I will be carrying on my foot campaign over the next weeks, so if you would like to meet me, please just let me know, it would be my pleasure.

Best regards, Gary Moody Candidate, District 2, Parti montarvillois gmoody@partimontarvillois.org

Candidates Profile

Martin Murray, founding member, mayor’s candidacy, with his son Maxime

Mance Cléroux – District 1 Mance Cléroux & Paul St-Onge (district 6). Years after years to care for Education, Health and social needs.

•Citizen of St-Bruno for 31 years ; •Practicing notary, involved in asset management and Director-General of a province-wide organisation ; •Administrator of L’Envol, a charitable organisation in aid of young mothers, and ex-administrator of various health and social service institutions and the Regional Development Council of Montérégie ; •Very active volunteer for various sports and PTAs in St-Bruno during the 80s and 90s.

Gary Moody – District 2 •Citizen of Saint-Bruno for 3 years ; •Immigrated to Quebec from the U.K. in 1999, and has lived on four continents ; •Geophysicist by profession, with a B Sc. in astrophysics and an M Sc. in geophysics, currently completing an M Eng. in environmental engineering at the ÉTS ; •Father of two young children, dedicated to the preservation of our natural heritage for the benefit of future generations.

Roxanne Jodoin – District 3 Roxanne and Yannick with Delphine

•Citizen of Saint-Bruno since birth (23 years) ; •Graduate in public relations from the UQAM, having completed several internships in strategic planning and media relations at Cossette Communications Marketing and Enzyme Marketing ; •Currently works as Project Manager for special events at L’Oréal Canada organising corporate events throughout North America and Europe.

Pierre Henrichon – District 4 Pierre and Roxanne with Delphine

•Citizen of Saint-Bruno for 36 years ; •Graduate in Administration, Public and Industrial Relations, with a career as a senior civil servant at the federal and provincial levels ; •Sat on the board of directors of several local development centers and the Cégep of St-Jean-sur-Richelieu. Collaborates with the École Nationale d’Administration Publique in the training of managers for government.

Jacques Bédard – District 5 Jacques with his daughters •Citizen of Saint-Bruno for 4 years ; •Co-owner and director of business development for Impact Détail, a national company with over 400 employees ; •Very experienced in the domain of sales, marketing and distribution, acquired in the food industry ; •Currently sits on the board of the Mont-Saint-Bruno secondary school.

Paul St-Onge – District 6 •Citizen of Saint-Bruno for 31 years ; •Masters degree in psycho-pedagogy for special education, counsellor and consultant in mental health ; •Previously a volunteer for various sports and PTAs in St-Bruno, currently Commissioner of the school board and Administrator of the Cégep Édouard-Montpetit, as well as the Montérégie Youth Center and the Health and Social Services Agency of the Montérégie.

Hassan Jamali with his sons – District 7 •Citizen of Saint-Bruno for 7 years ; •Holds a PhD in engineering from the Paul Sabatier University in Toulouse, currently teaches electrical engineering at Ahuntsic College ; •Father of four children, each born on a different continent, has published two books on digital communications and a guide for immigrants that won the Quebec Citizen’s Prize in 2004.

Michèle Archambault – District 8 We have to care for everybody

•Citizen of Saint-Bruno since birth (24 years) ; •Graduate in Commerce and International Relations from McGill University ; •Completed internships in Barcelona, Spain and Monterrey, Mexico (a micro-finance project sponsored by Développement International Desjardins and CIDA) ; •Currently works as a financial analyst for the National Bank of Canada ; •Accomplished musician and piano teacher for over 7 years in St-Bruno.

Here’s a letter signed by 50 citizens about the new local urban plan

The future of St-Bruno : urban sprawl and deforestation.

On the front page of Les Versants weekly local paper dated May 6th, we got a glimpse of the future of St-Bruno ; a massive expansion of housing projects south of route 116. Would the management of this paper have us jumping for joy at the prospect ? Unfortunately, this was not our reaction to the news, no matter how well it was presented. It was more one of feeling cheated.

As such, the future of St-Bruno seems destined to be one of degraded natural habitat and loss of biodiversity. Concrete and asphalt will cover the 175 hectares of fertile land, wetlands will be drained, and forest will be clear cut.

At least the article is clear about the intentions of the current administration : a political will to encourage urban sprawl despite all the studies showing its negative effects on the quality of the air, water and soil, not to mention the effect on our local biodiversity. And all of this is covered with a liberal quantity of greenwash.

Here we are referring, amongst others, to the conservation plan for the striped chorus frog in the Montérégie that was presented to the town of St-Bruno in June 2008, and was intended to inform the municipal authorities of the fact that this animal has lost 90% of its historical distribution. One of the small remaining areas is situated inside the St-Bruno town limits, more specifically in the “Grand Bois de St-Bruno/Carignan”, exactly where the new development is proposed.

The plan’s authors warned the municipal authorities of the disastrous consequences for this animal of any development plans in its remaining habitat, and recommended that the public be made aware of the conservation plan. Have any of you heard of this plan ?

More and more often we hear of citizens saying they wish to leave St-Bruno because they are so disappointed with the development model selected by our representatives for us, and for the most part without our consent, with the exception of a few people taken in by the possibility of lucrative land speculation. We also hear of the sadness and sense of powerlessness in the face of the land developers and the municipality, whose principal criteria for development seems to be to increase their property tax revenues. Has our municipality turned into a scrooge, counting his pennies with no regard to the barren waste he is creating around him ?

We feel that our elected leaders are taking us down a one-way street towards ecological disaster. Over the last few years, we have seen many instances of deforestation in St-Bruno, and we continue to see the threat of future developments adjacent to the national park of Mount St-Bruno, such as on Chemin des Hirondelles and at the east end of Clairevue Boulevard.

Why can’t we follow the example of our neighbours in Mont St-Hilaire, who have just adopted a policy of consolidation of private and public lots adjacent to Mount St-Hilaire, and who live in harmony with the Nature Conservation Centre of Mount St-Hilaire ?

We should concentrate our efforts on slowing down urban sprawl, with its enormous costs to society and the economy, and its contribution to the deterioration of our quality of life, local ecosystems, to the loss of fertile farmland and wetlands.

The two photos (accompanied by the title ; Des années 1960 à 2000) :

Good job, Mr. Journalist, having been through the archives and shown us the difference between the aerial photos taken in 1964 and 2007. We can clearly see the destruction of fertile farmland that was not adequately protected. We find it sad that our representatives fail to see the link between the reduction in arable land, the decline of agriculture in Quebec, and the increase in the price of food. This failure has led to an increase in food imports from abroad, at great expense in energy for transport, not to mention the associated emissions of greenhouse gases.

The photo captions presented in the article should have read as follows : 1964 : Fertile arable land of St-Bruno 2007 : disappearance of arable land, deforestation, urban sprawl, and the degradation of local biodiversity encouraged by our decision makers

It’s not only in the Amazon that destruction happens it’s happening right in our backyard !

We do, however, have faith in our political system. We know that when citizens are mobilized, they can make a difference. Remember the battles won against the privatisation of Mont Orford and against the Suroît power project. It must be said : yes we can !

Women residents less and less proud to live in St-Bruno :

Marie Lyne Ethier and 50 other citizens

Saint-Bruno-de-Montarville continues to degrade its natural heritage

Saint-Bruno-de-Montarville, October 14th, 2009. The new Urban Development Plan for St-Bruno, adopted on June 15th, 2009, will put over 4,4 million square feet of woodland, wetland and green space at risk to urban development over the coming years. Despite the results of studies commissioned by the town in 2007 and the conservation plan for the striped chorus frog completed in 2008, the municipal authorities have decided to go ahead with development plans that would result in the destruction of a large area with exceptional biodiversity.

By gathering the national and regional press at the principal wetland site in St-Bruno, the Parti montarvillois wishes to draw the attention of locals and the wider population of the Montérégie to the extremely fragile status of natural heritage here.

According to the party leader and candidate for mayor of St-Bruno on November 1st, Mr. Martin Murray, there are currently three sites within the town limits that are particularly vulnerable. First of all approximately half a million square feet of mature woodland on the mountain, where there are plans to build luxury houses, secondly a green space of 0,4 million sq. ft. adjacent to the National Park of Mont St-Bruno that the town has given to a developer to build a daycare center on despite the existence of a better site near the town centre, and lastly the 39 hectares of woodland and wetland south of Route 116, currently owned by private interests only too happy to oblige the town’s wish to develop here.

“Just prior to the upcoming climate change negotiations in Copenhagen and at a time when many people are worried about the accelerating degradation of our biodiversity, it is to me inconceivable that a local municipality can be so blind and actually contribute to the problem”, said Mr. Murray.

The Parti montarvillois makes an electoral promise to set up a Natural Conservation Policy for St-Bruno.

The party administration will make public and encourage the distribution of all the studies carried out on behalf of the town regarding the wealth of its natural heritage, and which were subsequently buried. Secondly, a moratorium will be put on the three site mentioned above, in order to carry out an exhaustive characterisation and to examine provincial and federal laws and programmes that are available and would allow their conservation in perpetuity.

The new Conservation Policy will include all of the territory of St-Bruno, notably its substantial agricultural zones.

This approach is aligned with the party’s commitment to subscribe to a Local Agenda 21. This agenda for the 21st century was first proposed at the Rio Earth Summit in 1992 and includes two parts, namely a detailed inventory of the territory and an evaluation of current policies with respect to sustainable development principles.

“The administration of the party will seek to collaborate closely with the citizens for this important task, which will be seen as a true common project beneficial to current and future generations”, noted Mr. Murray.