Sent 2006-05-24

2647 chemin du Village
St. Adolphe d’Howard
Quebec J0T 2B0
819-327-2103

By email  
Open letter to Dr. Pierre Roy
Mayor of Saint-Adolphe-d’Howard

Monsieur le Maire,

I was very encouraged that very early in your mandate, you kept your promise to hold a public consultation on the nautical by-law, and that you then formed a consultative committee with the participation of all associations concerned. The committee, on which I represented the Chamber of Commerce and Tourism of Saint Adolphe d'Howard, worked very well together, and even if the committee was not always unanimous, we found solutions that were supported by the majority, and at least acceptable to all.

Further, members of the committee offered some very positive suggestions, such as the sale of non-obligatory stickers for non-motorized craft, and a sponsorship program for businesses, so that all members of our community that benefit from our lakes would be able to contribute to their protection and surveillance.

It was in this spirit of community that the committee's meeting of April 7 ended (at midnight) with the hope that we were about to embark upon a new era of cooperation and compromise in Saint Adolphe, with respect for the interests and needs of all members of our community, specifically with respect to access to the lakes and the code of ethics, and it is in this context that I am at a loss to understand the actions of your administration since that meeting.

After having assured the members of the committee that they would consult us before presenting their recommendations to City Council, the councilor responsible and the Director of Recreo-Touristic Services ignored this commitment, and drafted a by-law and code of ethics that contradicts the work of the committee on major issues, and then did not even inform the members of City Council of the recommendations of the committee or the votes it had taken on these issues. I understand that the final decisions are taken by City Council, but what purposes are served by forming a consultative committee whose recommendations are not even presented to City Council?

At the press conference held on May 17, the Director of Recreo-Touristic Services gave the impression that the disaccord with the code of ethics on the part of the Association des Sports Nautique des lacs Saint-Joseph et Sainte-Marie was based on "a little half-hour in the morning", which is simply false. He did not mention the "restriction" in the middle of the day, which is one of the real problems with the code of ethics, and which was never discussed by the committee. Are his arguments so weak that he has to give false information to members of the media in order to support them?

Further, the councilor responsible indicated that his recommendations arose from the submissions to the public consultation, but these submissions were never provided to the members of the consultative committee, and when I requested a list of submissions, the Director of Recreo-Touristic Services replied that I would have to submit an access to information request. I remind you that prior to his election, the councilor responsible criticized the former administration's practice of requiring formal requests for documents that are clearly public. Is a list of submissions to a public consultation considered confidential? And the submissions as well?

At the City Council meeting of May 19, when I addressed a question to certain councilors regarding the information they received prior to the adoption of By-Law 535-2, you intercepted the question in an effort to prevent the councilors from answering for themselves. Please note that Article 150 of the Municipal Code provides for  "a period during which the persons attending may put oral questions to the council members", and not only to the Mayor. How are your actions at the Council meeting in line with your electoral promises concerning democracy and transparence?

When three associations out of six on a consultative committee cannot accept the decisions taken by the Council (which were based on false information), it leads one to doubt the sincerity of your electoral promises concerning democracy, consultation, and transparence. The actions of the councilor responsible and your Director of Recreo-Touristic Services show a lack of integrity on their part, put an end to any hope of homologating the code of ethics, and invite challenges of the by-law that may put the municipality at risk of losing all control over access to the lakes.

Rather than proceeding in the context of community spirit and compromise, you have effectively negated the work of the committee, and the actions of your administration in this matter threaten to recreate the divisions that characterized our community in recent years.

In Saint Adolphe, transparency is more opaque than ever.

Sincerely,

Allan Feldman