The media debate on the Office de consultation publique de Montréal and the expenses of its leaders requires certain nuances to be made. This challenges us as university professors and researchers.
Institutions in our contemporary societies are regularly victims of problems of all kinds: more or less pronounced dysfunctions, embezzlement, nepotism, political interference, misappropriation of mission, budgetary laxity, etc. Numerous reports issued by audit bodies, as well as the numerous interventions by the Quebec Municipal Commission, remind us that, despite the existence of operating rules, failures and slippages are always possible.
Recent revelations on financial management at the Office de consultation publique de Montréal (OCPM) show that vigilance is required and that the lessons that should be learned from past experiences are not always there, far from it. .
The indignation concerning the culture of operating and representation expenses which would have prevailed at the OCPM is therefore understandable and justified. What is less clear is the drift to which it quickly led. Everything happens as if what was recently revealed had something to do with the way in which the organization’s public consultation reports were produced and received by elected officials. In other words, the OCPM would be useless, in addition to being managed haphazardly. So we might as well get rid of it.
But are the OCPM, like the Office of Public Hearings on the Environment (BAPE), the Longueuil Public Participation Office or other citizen consultation-participation mechanisms, as useless as some suggest?
First, public consultation is not an instrument of direct democracy. Its effectiveness is not measured by the immediate effect on the decision but by the ability to create a debate and generate exchanges which will contribute to the decision, which remains the prerogative of elected officials. Public consultation is accompanied by collective and individual learning, speaking out and participating in debates, effects which do not make the headlines but which nevertheless contribute to the quality of democratic processes and projects.
Secondly, a public consultation report contains several recommendations, fueled, remember, by testimonies, analyzes and reflections, and it is impossible to judge its effect by only looking at the continuation or not of a project. Often, these recommendations have effects years later, for example with the purchase of land which helps protect a wood in a neighborhood. The report on racism and systemic discrimination includes numerous recommendations affecting several areas of intervention by the City, which have begun to be implemented gradually. The establishment of a systematic monitoring instrument for recommendations would be more conclusive and nuanced than a rapid judgment on the scope of the OCPM.
Third, officials as well as citizens rely on reporting as an instrument of accountability. This is also why Montrealers and civil society regularly demand a public consultation led by the OCPM when a participatory process is not subject to it: they appreciate the independent character and transparency of such a process, which which clearly demonstrates the legitimacy of this institution. This legitimacy is based on 3 pillars: 1) a neutral and independent institution; 2) transparency of the consultation process; 3) the production of recommendations intended to inform decision-making by elected officials.
Fourth, it is also important to cite the mass of work produced over the past 20 years in quantity and quality on very varied subjects, in particular thanks to the internal work of analysts. Moreover, the seriousness of these approaches has led certain developers to avoid presenting poorly put together projects and instead to also raise the quality of their planning and presentation, knowing that they would be closely scrutinized. Civil servants themselves are encouraged to better justify their point of view and their recommendations.
It is worth remembering that citizens’ demands for participatory democracy go back several decades. Obtaining, in 1973, a parliamentary commission on the pumped reserve hydroelectric power station project in the Jacques-Cartier valley was the origin of a long and difficult collective process which gradually allowed citizens, more and more numerous, to make themselves heard. The OCPM was created in 2002, following a mobilization of Montreal civil society at the end of the 1990s in the face of the abolition of the first participatory mechanisms in Montreal, including the Bureau de consultation de Montréal (BCM).
Numerous studies carried out here and elsewhere demonstrate the importance of such organizations dedicated to citizen consultation-participation and the positive impacts of the mandates entrusted to them. Reducing their relevance to an accounting of the reception given to them reveals a lack of understanding of their contributions to the emergence of debates essential to better collective management of the major issues we face. Instead, let us take the opportunity of this crisis to strengthen this institution, in particular by reviewing the nomination and accountability processes of its leaders and by setting up a tool for monitoring recommendations.
*Also signed this letter:
Jonathan Durand Folco, associate professor at the School of Social Innovation (Saint Paul University); Raphaël Fischler, professor of urban planning (University of Montreal); Michel Gariépy, professor emeritus in urban planning (University of Montreal); Peter Jacobs, professor emeritus of landscape architecture (University of Montreal); Florence Junca-Adenot, associate professor, urban and tourism studies (Université du Québec à Montréal); Anne Latendresse, professor of geography (University of Quebec in Montreal); Marie Lessard, professor emeritus in urban planning (University of Montreal); Franck Scherrer, professor of urban planning (University of Montreal)