Mayoral candidate announces new party
An entrepreneur called Félix-Antoine Joli-Cœur has announced his candidacy in November’s mayoral election, along with a new party, Ralliement pour Montréal.
Meanwhile, Denis Coderre is publishing a book in March to talk about his achievements and his vision, expected to be a springboard to an attempt to retake the mayoralty.
DeWolf 11:28 on 2021-01-18 Permalink
Formula E, transit cuts, a giant concrete tarmac on St. Helen’s Island, handshake deals with developers, million-dollar concrete blocks on the mountain… am I missing anything?
I guess the Ste-Catherine Street makeover did take shape under his administration, so I’ll give him credit for that.
Kate 12:20 on 2021-01-18 Permalink
Denis Coderre looked like a reasonably stable relief after the messy debacle of the end of the Tremblay administration, but there’s not a lot more to be said for his time in office. Ste‑Catherine Street’s infrastructure was going to have to be done over sometime, it was just a question of which administration would take the plunge. Luckily Projet nixed the Coderre-era plan to install a vastly expensive inflated arch over the whole site.
I also remember Coderre as the man who told a cop “I’m your boss” and who tried to run surveillance on Patrick Lagacé. And he was much too interested in how his position gave him access to big shots.
Bill Binns 14:04 on 2021-01-18 Permalink
Let’s hope some better options materialize. I would very much like to see Projet go back to being the crazy bicycle party of the Plateau but even I probably wouldn’t choose either of these guys over Plante.
I stopped reading about Mr Double hyphen above when I read “worked for Pauline Marois and Gerald Tremblay”. That’s really all I need to know about him.
@DeWolf – I would add the Haiti trip, the bookstore window incident, the jackhammering mailboxes incident, the 300k city hall rooftop VIP party tent, the million dollar Richler gazebo and possibly worst of all, the 50 million dollar trail of Adirondack chairs from the Old Port to Mount Royal. Everytime I see what was done to the beautiful old stairs from the McGill campus to D9c Penfield I get good and pissed at Coderre all over again.
Cadichon 14:12 on 2021-01-18 Permalink
Also worked for Labonté before that.
Jack 14:55 on 2021-01-18 Permalink
Yeah remember him…..
david255 17:19 on 2021-01-18 Permalink
Bill – the new stairs at Mactavish up to Penfield make me irate every time I see them.
To this, I’d add the absurd $10,000,000+ to refurbish and expand baseball diamonds at our parks, at the expense of actually used park spaces; the complete destruction of the place de l’homme and the entire surrounding area out on Ile Sainte Helene; and the likely criminal (if anyone cared to look into it) sweetheart deal that led to the destruction of the Children’s. While we’re at it, that renovation of Cabot Square was absolute dogshit that made it far worse.
david255 17:25 on 2021-01-18 Permalink
Another one was his capitulation to the crazies on the whole Maison Alcan project. Now that people have moved on, we’re getting a less interesting project at an equally high rate of change – the difference, of course, is that Phyllis Lambert is out of the picture now.
ant6n 05:58 on 2021-01-19 Permalink
“cut the mic”
ant6n 06:02 on 2021-01-19 Permalink
…there was also that interesting bit about the REM thing he helped push through (“the Bape n`est pas de pape”), and then after his term he suddenly was appointed to the board of directors of of Eurostar. That`s the company running high speed trains between London and Paris, in which the CDPQ bought a 40% stake in 2015.
Tee Owe 13:13 on 2021-01-19 Permalink
@ant6n – Not sure he should be so happy with his Eurostar involvement right now https://www.theguardian.com/business/2021/jan/17/eurostar-warns-of-risk-to-survival-without-government-help-covid-pandemic
dwgs 17:12 on 2021-01-19 Permalink
So incompetent he even brought down Eurostar!
Ant6n 19:21 on 2021-01-19 Permalink
@Tee One
Why would he care if the company does badly. He’s a board member, not an investor.
thomas 03:17 on 2021-01-20 Permalink
Usually board members are paid in some cash plus stock options The cash component is usually connected to expenses in attending meetings — maybe he can claim his internet. The windfall is usually in the stock options which in this case is probably worthless.
So he is stuck with all the headaches and none of the reward. At least I hope so.