The City of Coteau-du-Lac requested, obtained and finally rejected a grant of two million dollars from Quebec and Ottawa for the construction of a new municipal library.
The project supported by Mayor Andrée Brosseau fell, four votes to three, during a vote held at the municipal council on October 21. The City had until Friday to accept the envelope from higher levels of government.
The budget for the construction of the new library was first estimated at $4 million when the project was launched in November 2020. It was revised to over $6 million about a year later after the federal election. of 2021.
Ottawa has released one million from the Invest in Canada program, which includes a cultural component. Quebec added $956,500 from its cultural infrastructure development assistance program. The financial package therefore required the municipality to inject at least 4 million into the site.
sum too large
The amount was ultimately deemed too large by a majority of elected officials in the context of a possible recession, rising interest rates and construction costs, but also in view of the need to invest in renovating other city infrastructure. In addition, the municipal council was not obliged to commit to building the new equipment despite the subsidy request.
The communications department informed the To have to that the mayor was not available to comment on the situation, referring to a statement posted online by Ms.me Brush. It was also impossible to obtain a comment from the four municipal councilors opposed to the project.
I deeply believe that a municipality must invest in its services even in times of recession. The services offered by a library are free. If you invest in an attractive, charming cultural centre, people will go to it in large numbers.
“If ever the reconstruction project does not work and we lose the subsidy, we may still be able to start a renovation,” says Christine Arsenault, municipal councilor who supported the project in the vote last month before standing down. in the opinion that citizens were not sufficiently consulted on the advisability of this multimillion-dollar project.
“It’s very important that people know that we’re not giving up on the idea of having a new library. We want to renovate it or rebuild it. But at the moment, I don’t think we have enough information to be able to move forward, and that’s a shame. »
For 10,000 Coteaulac residents
The planned construction quadrupled the space occupied by the current establishment, named in honor of journalist Jules Fournier (1884-1918), a native of Coteau-du-Lac and contributor to the To have to from the very first hour. The current site was not necessarily to be chosen for the new construction of 925 m2 meeting the needs of a population of approximately 10,000 inhabitants. The growing municipality currently has approximately 7,600 Coteaulacois.
Anik Tremblay is one of them. She has lived in the city for seven years. She describes herself as “a fervent user” of the Jules-Fournier library with her son. She recounts having received the public announcement of the reconstruction project with joy and having experienced such great disappointment at the fateful vote in October.
“Everyone thought it was in the pocket,” she said. The current library is not adequate. There are books everywhere and rooms in the basement. […] We want an extension of the subsidy agreement. I don’t understand, basically, why the population was not consulted on this project, and we should therefore ask the departments concerned for time to carry out this consultation. It is not up to elected officials to decide for us. »
Motion of censure
It was impossible to get a reaction from the Ministry of Culture. Mme Tremblay has launched a pro-library online petition that has already garnered over 600 signatures.
She went with other citizens to the last city council this week. She was surprised to see a vote of no confidence against Mayor Brosseau by elected municipal officials who blame her for a lack of transparency in the library file.
“They say that the information changes regularly, and I have a lot of difficulty understanding this position, because from the start, as soon as the application for the 2021 number grant was submitted, we already had the working document with all the figures. , including the capital budget, says adviser David-Lee Amos, library pro. My colleagues are banging on the desk saying they never had access to this information. It’s wrong. There is nothing hidden, and the information was refiled in July. »
Elected officials, including the mayor, are independent, with no affiliation to a municipal political party. Mr. Amos, who was born in Coteau-du-Lac, like Mr.me Arsenault, moreover, repeats with Mme Tremblay that accepting the subsidies does not commit the City to carrying out the work. He supported the project at the start and he thinks that his constituents could have been consulted before the start of construction set in the agreement with Quebec and Ottawa on December 31, 2026.
Finally, he returns to the importance of the library as a municipal facility. “I deeply believe that a municipality must invest in its services even in times of recession. The services offered by a library are free. If you invest in an attractive, charming cultural centre, people will go to it in large numbers. »