Quote of the week

“[Communication] probably wasn’t his strongest point, but we all have our weaknesses.” —Habs captain Saku Koivu, on fired coach Guy Carbonneau.

Molson bloats

With Sunday’s news that the city and province are going to pony up a whopping $23.3-million to finance the expansion of McGill’s Molson stadium, home of the CFL’s Alouettes, residents are worrying about how the extra 5,000 beer-swilling fans will affect their already besieged neighbourhood.

The stadium, on the side of Mount Royal near des Pins and University, is owned by McGill but leased by the Als for their nine home games per season. Its current capacity is 20,202, but the investment—$19.3-million from Quebec, $4-million from Montreal and $6-million from the franchise—will boost it to 25,000.

“It’s a done deal,” says Lucia Kowaluk, the president of the Milton Parc Citizens’ Committee, made up of some 80 people living in the area. “What we are concerned about now is working with the police and other security services to see that people behave, that there are proper toilets so people don’t have to urinate in public places, and efforts are made to keep the noise down.”

Mayor Gérald Tremblay promised on Sunday that the project will “be built in total harmony with the community,” though Kowaluk says her job will be to continue “to be vigilant in order to protect our neighbourhood.”

by Patrick Lejtenyi

Eye on
brotherhood

2008 won’t go down as the best year for police-citizen relations. When Montreal North flared up into full-scale rioting following the police shooting death of unarmed 18-year-old Fredy Villanueva in August, it was the first instance in which many people in the city had even thought about the borough and its myriad problems. Despite the calm that has since settled, anti-police brutality activists will be bringing the issue up at this year’s annual march, taking place next Sunday. But they’ll also be targeting the police brotherhood, the fraternal organization that looks out for its members in times of trouble. The brotherhood is defending the two officers implicated in the Villanueva shooting in a lawsuit launched last month by two other youths who were shot and injured during the same confrontation.

This is not the first time the Coalition Opposed to Police Brutality (COPB) points its finger at the police brotherhood, says spokesperson Gabrielle Potvin. “We’ve held vigils in front of the brotherhood’s office” on Gilford in the Plateau following the 2003 death of Michel Berniquez and the 2005 death of Mohammed Anas Bennis. “But this will be the first time we single it out on the March 15 demonstration.”

The demo takes place Sunday, March 15, beginning at Mont-Royal metro at 2 p.m.

by Patrick Lejtenyi

The sleep science

On the off-chance you didn’t already know this, international Brain Awareness Week gets underway next Monday, March 16, and just in case you were worried Montreal was going to be left out of the action, fear not, there’ll be a ton of cool, interesting stuff going down here to mark the occasion.

Among them, as part of the Scientific Café series, will be a discussion among the public and a team of Montreal researchers specializing in neuroscience, sleep and dreams. Taking place Wednesday, March 18, at 6:30 p.m., at Ô Patro Vys (356 Mont-Royal E)¸ event spokesperson Élise Barbeau promises, “This will be fun. Research, of course, can be pretty serious, but it can be fun as well. So we’ll be presenting this as a casual affair. Each of our four speakers will talk about the area of brain research they specialize in within the context of sleep and dreams and people will be able to ask them whatever questions they want on their respective topics. We’ll have food and drinks there, it’s free to attend and we’ve even got a band, the Blue Monkey Group, who’ll be playing when the discussion concludes at the end of the night.”

For more information on local Brain Awareness Week activities, go to sfn-montreal.ca/baw.

by Chris Barry

Study meets world

QPIRG Concordia has found a solution for students who are too busy to be activists and activists who are too busy to be students. Study in Action is an undergraduate conference taking place March 13-15 at Concordia (1455 de Maisonneuve W., 7th floor) that aims to introduce the two parties over a weekend of workshops and conferences on subjects that unite them.

“There’s sometimes a sense in university that you’re not part of real life,” says QPIRG Concordia coordinator Nathalie Cohen. “The mandate of the conference is to match up all the things students are studying, researching and writing about with the real needs of community and activist organizations working on the ground.”

Last year’s festival ended with the launch of the Community University Research Exchange (CURE), a partnership that allows community groups to post internships and research projects that students at Concordia and McGill can complete for credit.

This year’s theme is Occupation and Resistance. “We were inspired by mobilizations that are already underway for events like the G8 Summit in Hunstville, Ontario in July 2010 as well as the Vancouver Olympics and the indigenous struggles,” says Cohen.

For the full schedule see qpirgconcordia.org/studyinaction.

by Matt Jones

Rear-view mirror

18 YEARS AGO - MARCH 14–21, 1991

On the cover: A derelict building, representing squatting. The article blames the rise in squatting on idle developers and changes to unemployment insurance and welfare rules. “Bob Smythe,” an American whose squat at the corner of Pine and Laval just burned down, says, “In any other city [than Montreal], you can get by without hot water and heat.”
•In Jump Cut, the VHS release column, Steve Kokker writes about Solo Voyage, “the Russian equivalent of Rambo. The effects are cheap by our spoiled standards, but the film is fun—where else can we see a Russian actor playing an American talking in Russian but dubbed into English?”
•Jenny Ross writes about SCGB—“satisfyin’ Cdn geetar bands”—in Notes From Underground. Noteworthy SCGB include “N. Pikes, TPOH, T Hip, B Rodeo, Grapes, Nat’l Velvet, C. James, Sons of Freedom.”
• In the Female Persuasions column, Anne Cloutier writes angrily about the downtown Linen Chest ads, which, she says, represent the “perfect pink and white life” women have been programmed to accept by “reactionary men.”

Angel >> Civil liberties Federal Justice Minister Rob Nicholson is trying to bring back some controversial anti-terror legislation, and, given the contentious history of police powers in the country since 9/11, it has some people worrying. The measures—initially introduced by the Liberals in December 2001—include giving police the power of preventative, warrant-less arrest and summoning people to provide information to a judge in secret hearings on pain of imprisonment for non-compliance. The original bill had a five-year sunset clause that the Liberals let expire, and the Grits fought against the Tories when they wanted to re-introduce them in 2007. Civil liberties advocates say police already have enough power and, as Adil Charkaoui can attest, giving cops extra ones can lead to serious abuses.

Insect >>Henri-Paul Rousseau The former head of the Caisse de dépot et placement du Québec told a business audience on Monday that, while he’s sorry the pension fund lost a staggering $39.8-billion in 2008, he isn’t the guy to blame. Some chutzpah. Although he resigned last May, before the current financial calamity unfolded, it’s highly unlikely the fund suddenly saw its value evaporate thanks only to incompetence on the part of his successors. Certainly other, better prepared funds weathered the storm far better than the Caisse did. This “Who, me?” capitalism—ride high in the good times, squirm and wriggle and obfuscate in bad—isn’t unique to Wall Street weasels, apparently.