Council highlights of June 3 2008

The recommendations approved by the borough council revolved mainly around two things: the unveiling of the Security Committee’s Action Plan and the intervention of two citizens. All in all, it was a pretty short council meeting filled mostly with minor events.

Councillor Maurice Cohen was reappointed for an eight consecutive time as a member of the regional council of Quebec for the Federation of Canadian Municipalities.

A St. Laurent resident took the microphone during the public question period to ask about the last Aéroports de Montréal meeting. However, she didn’t mention anything about night flights. Her main issue was with the noise created by the construction of new hangars. According to her, the noise level is now even higher at night. “It seems like there’s more noise around 2 a.m. Do you know if other construction works are scheduled?”

She was told that the construction works are not taking place on the St. Laurent portion of the airport, so only Dorval would be able to really answer the question.

Another citizen handed in a document and a petition signed by over 50 people from the Félix-Leclerc Avenue neighbourhood, located between Henri-Bourassa and Gascon. The group deplores the fact that the speed limit it not reduced to 30 km/h. “Drivers go 70 km/h and they never make their stops,” said the woman who also demands a speed-bump. Mayor Alan DeSousa had a three-level answer for her. He first said that the different methods that could be use to slow down traffic in residential areas are still being worked on. He added that the police department is doing everything possible to catch drivers who exceed the speed limit. Finally, he pulled the Cavendish card out saying the opening of the boulevard will likely help reduce traffic in the Félix-Leclerc sector too. “The problem are the drivers living in the area,” repeated the citizen, who hopes to see the borough coming up with a long-term solution as fast as possible.

The Centres locaux de Développement’s Plan d’Action Local pour l’Économie et l’Emploi for 2008-2011 was adopted by the council. Borough director Serge Lamontagne reminded the different elements of the plan and its objectives, like the manufacturing sector, business starting initiatives and measures towards helping immigrant business owners.

An amount of $14,733 was granted to the COSSL for this ongoing year and the next two. This is in accordance with the Initiative montréalaise de soutien au développement social local program.

The 2008-2009 Action Plan of the Security Committee was handed in near the end of the council meeting and Mr. Lamontagne went down the list of its most important aspects. Since 2003, the SPVM, the fire department and some of the borough’s community workers have been working together to elaborate this plan.

The Urban Security Patrol also handed in its bimonthly report for the months of April and May. To this day, the patrol made 4,220 interventions, most of them occurring while doing surveillance. Other examples are noisy construction sites, illegal advertisement and alcohol or drug related public security issues (46 interventions).

According to neighbourhood police 7, in the last two months crime indicators have been decreasing. The borough’s police station is proud to have caught a man who’s suspected of stealing luxury cars in the Côte-de-Liesse sector.

In regards to urban surveillance, police officers have mainly targeted the Côte-Vertu metro station.

The next council meeting will be held Wednesday July 2nd and not July 1st since it’s Canada Day.



(Translated by Pascal LeBlanc)