Moving the SAQ | The mayor of Victoriaville sees red

The mayor of Victoriaville accuses the SAQ of being in contradiction with Quebec in terms of land use planning

Last June, Quebec unveiled a new plan in downtown Victoriaville to revitalize the province’s village centers. Three months later, this same city center finds itself threatened, with the Société des alcools du Québec (SAQ) planning to move its branch to a residential area located further away. The mayor denounces this project in total contradiction with the government’s discourse and based on the attraction of profits.

At the end of the line, Antoine Tardif does not lose his temper. He learned last summer, from the mouths of representatives of the SAQ, that it wanted to move its branch located downtown, rue Notre-Dame Est, to a “low-density residential” sector on the outskirts, explains -he.

The news had the effect of a bomb at city hall, where we have been working for several years to get the municipality’s downtown back on track.

Millions have been invested for this purpose and the Quebec government has also committed to the adventure by granting a sum of $800,000 for the project, describes Antoine Tardif. A medical clinic has finally opened its doors there.

Result: the vacancy rate for commercial premises on the ground floor fell from 16% to 5% over the last year.

However, the departure of the SAQ risks creating a gaping hole, deplores Antoine Tardif. “As the SAQ is a monopoly, people inevitably have to go to the city center to make their purchases, which results in purchases in neighboring businesses,” he emphasizes. “That the SAQ is located in the city center is of capital importance. »

A clear plan

The elected official is all the more surprised by the decision of the state corporation as, according to him, it contravenes the orientations of the government of Quebec, which advocates in its National Architecture and Land Use Planning Policy (PNAAT ) the importance of revitalizing regional city centers.

The implementation plan for this policy, presented in downtown Victoriaville last June by the Minister of Municipal Affairs, Andrée Laforest, is clear on this subject.

“City centers, neighborhood centers and village cores constitute strong attractions where a variety of businesses and services essential to the vitality of communities are concentrated,” we can read there, in black and white.

The height of irony, according to the mayor of Victoriaville, Quebec also writes that “the establishment of commercial spaces in peripheral sectors, combined with [d’autres facteurs]generates a loss of dynamism and diversity in key sectors which nevertheless present strong potential for redevelopment.”

Questioned by the mayor of Victoriaville on this subject, the president of the SAQ, Jacques Farcy, replied that the SAQ is “required to meet commercial as well as economic obligations”.

Lose confidence

Citing a market analysis that the SAQ did not want to transmit to The Press since it would contain commercial information, Jacques Farcy affirms that the move of the branch from the city center will allow it “to offer better complementarity of services to customers”.

On Wednesday, the SAQ declared that it had chosen to extend the lease of its downtown branch by one year “in order not to rush things and with the aim of finding the best possible location in the sector to provide good service customers”. The Crown corporation has, however, confirmed that it will move forward with a call for tenders to find a new location.

“When we evaluate the most suitable locations for an SAQ branch, the number one criterion is to be at the heart of the commercial activities of the different regions of Quebec to facilitate the shopping journey of our customers,” explains the spokesperson for the state company, Geneviève Cormier.

The latter adds that the SAQ is “sensitive to government policies regarding land use planning” while recalling that it is not required to respect them. “We comply with it in the majority of cases,” says Geneviève Cormier.

For Antoine Tardif, however, this response is aberrant. “I’m losing confidence. If the government itself cannot impact its state corporations, who manages them? And who ensures that the government’s priorities are taken into consideration? », he sighs.

As vice-president of the Fédération québécoise des municipalities (FQM), he intends to raise this issue during the organization’s annual congress which will be held in the coming days.

What’s more, the case of Victoriaville is far from isolated, explains Gérard Beaudet, full professor at the School of Urban Planning and Landscape Architecture at the University of Montreal. The municipalities of Magog and Shawinigan have particularly been victims of moves of this type in recent years.