Commentaire 12 (Le 29 août 2022) – commentaires et rétroaction

Steve Barbera

I am communicating with you today to express my displeasure with the proposed changes to the boundaries of my electoral district, Ville-Marie, le Sud-Ouest, Ile-des-Soeurs. There are a number of issues I would like to bring to the attention of the committee responsible for setting these boundaries.

It is my understanding that the committee proposes to remove two areas from the riding which are:

An area surrounded by Atwater Avenue to the west, Rene Levesque Boulevard to the south, Guy Street to the East and Sherbrooke Street to the north (to be added to Westmount – Notre Dame de Grace); and

Areas north of Sherbrooke Street west of Peel Street, areas north of Doctor Penfield Avenue as well as an area north of Pine Avenue east of Doctor Penfield (to be added to Outremont).

In my opinion, these changes make little sense and should be reconsidered by the committee for a number of reasons.

First and foremost, this proposal divides downtown Montreal's English-speaking community over 3 ridings instead of just one, undoing a major step forward made by this committee a decade ago when our riding was created. Some have said that this group is currently being threatened in a number of respects, and this is not the time to divide them as unity and cohesiveness among this community is now essential.

Secondly, the new boundaries seem to be chosen somewhat arbitrarily, again in my humble opinion. They seem to ignore many of the natural boundaries that help to form the communities within our district, and in certain cases some of our community's most important institutions are being divided in two. For example, extending the Outremont district southwards over Mount-Royal to include the northern part of downtown is just confusing to me. There is literally a mountain separating downtown from Outremont. Electors living north of Sherbrooke Street identify as downtown residents, with the vast majority working and socializing in the downtown area. That is their community. In fact, the name "Outremont" plainly means the "outer side of the mountain". With all due respect I must tell you that I find this very strange.

At the institutional level, both campus of McGill University and Concordia University would also now be split over two ridings. I cannot think of a reason why this would be necessary as no voters live on Concordia's campus, and those who wo live at McGill typically either vote in their home province, or are not Canadian citizens an ineligible to vote. Whilst I do appreciate Canada's separation of powers between federal and provincial jurisdictions, I believe that Montrealers, especially downtown area residents, feel very attached to these institutions. Many people in the area work there, and there are also questions of research funding and other issues which potentially have federal implications. Again here, the proposed redrawing of the boundary seems both arbitrary and unnecessary. There are other examples regarding local institutions but I digress.

It is my understanding that somewhere within your committee's mandate there is a clause starting that something like "community interest" should be considered during this exercise. Again, I respectfully suggest that more can be done here to respect the community's interest. Furthermore, if it is absolutely necessary to reduce the size of our riding, then there seems to be other more practical ways to do so, respecting natural boundaries, communities and their institutions. Sections of the eastern part of the riding or south of the Ville Marie Expressway for instance, may have more community links with areas to the east than with the downtown core, or the Shaughnessy Village and Golden Square Mile areas which you now propose to remove from our riding.

Lastly, it is my understanding that a certain flexibility is permitted under the law regarding fluctuations in the amount of people living in one riding or another. Surely this provision was included for the exact reasons I have outlined herewith, to keep communities and their beloved institutions together.

With that, I thank you very much for your attention to these concerns, and look forward to engaging with you to address them upon your visit to Montreal in September.

With kind regards.