The Front: MegaMontreal

Tabulating merger mania

>> Untangling the confusion surrounding municipal amalgamation

by DOMINIQUE RITTER

No matter how you slice it, Montreal's got problems. And no matter how they plan to slice it up, the visionaries who have proposed to solve Montreal's woes by redefining boundaries and creating commissions seem only to have compounded the general confusion.

Perhaps most acute is the financial quandary of the city of Montreal. In recent decades, people have been settling in the 'burbs rather than in the heart of town--which means that people have been paying property taxes to the suburban municipalities, leaving the city of Montreal with a depleted tax base.

Then there's the almost inevitable factioning that occurs under the present structure. The suburban mayors treat their municipalities like fiefdoms, so when these mayors meet at the MUC (the inter-municipal organization which provides certain basic services, like policing), it's each mayor for his or her own municipality.

"The question becomes: how do we bail out Montreal and maintain the local quality of life?" explains Côte-St-Luc city councillor Dida Berku.

Over the past few weeks, five different groups have attempted to provide the answer to that question. So municipal movers and shakers are in unanimous agreement: something needs to change.

The next question is: what, exactly, would change? Who wins and who loses under each scenario? The Mirror has compiled the following "merger primer" to help local residents sort through the issues.

The status quo

The greater Montreal region is a hodgepodge of governments and bureaucrats. There are 29 municipalities on the island of Montreal; together, they make up the Montreal Urban Community (MUC). So not only does each municipality have a local government to administer, but each municipal mayor also sits on the MUC and attends to regional dossiers, which include public security (police), mass transit (MUCTC), environment, territorial development, property valuations and culture.

Then you have other municipal bodies doing their own thing, namely Laval and a handful of South Shore cities. The end result: a mess of governments representing local interests and no one speaking on behalf of the island or the region as a whole.

The proposals

Three versions of a new Montreal megacity have been proposed. They differ only on just how big the megacity should be:

* One island, three cities: this is the Quebec government's plan for Montreal, according to a leaked document;

* One island, one city: the vision of former mayor Jean Drapeau, also endorsed by current mayor Pierre Bourque;

* A Supercity encompassing Laval and South Shore. This has been proposed by former mayoral candidate Jacques Duchesneau.

In addition, there are two other proposals on the table:

* Greater Montreal Development Commission: A super commission to represent the Montreal region, made up of the municipal mayors themselves. This was proposed by the suburban mayors.

* The Metro Montreal Zone: An expanded MUC, whose representatives would be directly elected; proposed by current MUC chair Vera Danyluk.

What would change?
Each proposal has its own vision of how things should work. The chart below breaks down each proposal, according to five different issues.	Status quo	Megacity	Development commission	Montreal zone
Public works	Currently, the privilege of carting off your trash and recyclables belongs solely to your municipality. The same goes for snow clearance, park maintenance, pothole repair and firefighting. Contracts for these services are independently negotiated by the municipalities; some have their own blue collar workers, some use private contractors. The problem is that some municipalities are richer than others, and disparities in services arise as a result.	Amalgamating these city services, supposedly for simplicity's sake, is the main driving force behind merger mania. However, messing with blue collar unions ain't always peachy, as Mayor Bourque would admit after his protracted, expensive and heated feuds with, among other workers, firefighters.	Keep the status quo.	Keep the status quo.
Municipal autonomy	The beauty of the current structure is this: municipalities can do what is best for their citizens and their own long-term interests. Westmount can spend its tax dollars on designer dog runs and Côte-St-Luc can oppose a provincial plan to link Cavendish Blvd. with the Metropolitan. The problem is that there are 29 sets of different interests and, more often than not, Montreal is pitted against its surrounding suburbs.	Not only will Westmount lose its power to allocate funds to doggie park landscaping, but municipalities will cease to exist altogether. However, supposedly, the upside will be that all of Montreal's basic services will improve: potholes fixed and roads plowed.	Municipal mayors will actually gain power under this structure: they keep their fiefdoms and, through the Commission, get to represent "regional" interests as well.	The municipalities remain intact, but the mayors lose power because they would no longer have a seat-or a voice-in the MUC.
City halls & mayors	Each municipality has its own city hall, elected mayor and city councillors. The problem is that Montreal has 29 sets of these, which taxpayers must support and maintain.	We would kiss the mayors goodbye and wish them luck in their job hunts. The municipal city halls would be appropriated by the province, their fate unknown. Condos in the lovely Westmount city hall perhaps?	Mayors hold on to their jobs and their city hall offices.	Mayors and city halls stay put.
MUC	The mayors handle regional dossiers at the MUC. The problem is that, rather than being a decision-making forum, it often becomes a squabble forum. Current scraps include pending lawsuits and counter-lawsuits over a proposed incinerator.	No definitive word yet on whether the MUC would be eradicated. But it stands to reason that the MUC would be wiped out. When Toronto became a megacity, their regional commission was eradicated.	The mayors want to change the MUC into a simple bureaucracy which would take its orders from the newly created Commission, which they would control.	The MUC wants to kick the mayors out, and elect its own representatives directly. Danyluk proposes that the Zone (an expanded MUC) be comprised of 30 representatives from 30 metropolitan districts, of slightly different configuration than the municipalities, so as to avoid municipal interests being served by the Zone.
Taxation	Individual municipalities have the power to levy taxes on real estate; they then pay a proportional amount of their taxes to the MUC. The problem (for some people anyway) is that there is a large disparity in rates of taxation between municipalities. For instance, Montreal's tax rate is more than double Baie D'Urfé's-and even then, it still can't afford to pay for everything.	One level of property taxation would be applied uniformly across the region: "One level of uniformly high taxation," says Westmount mayor Peter Trent.	The present taxation structure would remain untouched.	The new Zone would levy its own tax and collect its own cash directly from property owners; according to the proposal, municipal taxes would be reduced accordingly. Also looming is the possibility of the Zone collecting some of the province's sales tax or gas tax.