Denis Coderre will not have finally succeeded in taking back the controls of the Town hall of Montreal. Sunday evening, the former mayor had to concede victory to his rival, Valérie Plante, for the second time in four years.
Faces were long at the Plaza Center-Ville hotel, where Ensemble Montreal had invited its troops. There were about fifteen activists when, around 9 p.m., Valérie Plante’s victory was confirmed. The few people present watched, through the screens installed in the room, the demonstrations of joy at the Projet Montreal camp.
At the time of this writing, Denis Coderre had still not shown up at the Ensemble Montreal meeting place. And we still did not know if he would occupy the position of leader of the opposition, his running mate, Chantal Rossi, having been elected without difficulty in the borough of Montreal-North.
Stars fail
Ensemble Montréal has retained some strongholds such as Saint-Léonard, where Michel Bissonnet was handily re-elected, Saint-Laurent, with Alan DeSousa, and Pierrefonds-Roxboro, won by Jim Beis. In Montreal-North, outgoing mayor, Christine Black, was not worried by Project Montreal’s star candidate, Will Prosper.
Denis Coderre’s party also made gains in Côte-des-Neiges – Notre-Dame-de-Grâce with the victory of Lionel Perez ahead of Gracia Kasoki Katahwa, of Projet Montreal, and Sue Montgomery.
Still, several stars of Ensemble Montreal bit the dust. In the district of Champlain – L’Île-des-Sœurs, Nadine Gelly, whom Denis Coderre had appointed as president of its executive committee in the event of an election, was defeated by Projet Montréal candidate Véronique Tremblay.
Denis Coderre also had a lot of hope in Guillaume Lavoie, who faced Laurence Lavigne Lalonde for mayor of Villeray – Saint-Michel – Parc-Extension, but the star candidate had to bow to his opponent. In Mercier – Hochelaga-Maisonneuve, Karine Boivin-Roy failed to dislodge Pierre Lessard-Blais. And Réal Ménard, who was trying to return to politics after his defeat in 2017, had to bow to Eric Alan Caldwell.
The fight was close for part of the evening in Rivière-des-Prairies – Pointe-aux-Trembles, but Ensemble Montréal candidate Lyne Laperrière was lagging behind outgoing mayor Caroline Bourgeois. In Ville-Marie, former Quebecor vice-president Serge Sasseville was heading for a victory over Daniel Tran of Projet Montreal. He was one of the few elected officials present at the Ensemble Montreal rally around 10 p.m., but declined to comment on the party’s defeat.
As for Antoine Richard, who had been talked about because of the flips real estate that he had done when he was a real estate broker, he had to concede the victory to the candidate of Projet Montreal, Marie-Andrée Mauger.
Difficult end of the campaign
The last week of the campaign was grueling for Denis Coderre, who was slow to reveal the names of the clients he had worked with over the past four years. A few days before the poll, he finally unveiled the eight mandates he had obtained, including those of Transcontinental and real estate giant Cogir. This affair was reminiscent of the Electric Formula episode in 2017.
Earlier in the campaign, Denis Coderre was also in the hot seat when he was surprised with a cell phone while driving. The City of Montreal Police Department gave him a statement of offense in connection with this case.
Denis Coderre also had to deal with problematic candidates. In the closing months of the campaign, he showed the door to several candidates, including Joe Ortona and Dan Kraft.
While in the spring, he led in the polls, his lead gradually eroded over the months. Starting in September, Denis Coderre and Valérie Plante found themselves neck and neck for several weeks. In the last week, however, two polls revealed that Valérie Plante held a slight lead over her opponent.
Denis Coderre had focused his campaign on key elements, including public safety and housing. Ensemble Montréal has notably promised to proceed with the hiring of 250 additional police officers and to launch a call for tenders to provide all police officers with portable cameras within the first 100 days of a mandate. The party had also announced its intention to double the strength of the mixed squads.
In terms of housing, Ensemble Montréal was targeting the construction of 50,000 dwellings “of all types” in four years. Denis Coderre also intended to abolish the Regulation for a mixed metropolis (known as “20-20-20”) to replace it with more “flexible” measures.