Eight in the race for city’s mayoralty

298 candidates in total running for 103 positions

The official deadline for becoming a candidate in the Nov. 5 municipal elections has passed and we now know who all the candidates are.

MAYOR OF MONTREAL

Eight people are running for mayor of Montreal:

Incumbent Denis Coderre will try to win a second term as head of his party Équipe Denis Coderre pour Montréal. Coderre, a former member of Parliament and cabinet minister, was first elected mayor of Montreal in 2013.

Valérie Plante, incumbent city councillor in Sainte-Marie district, is leader of the official opposition party Projet Montréal.

Jean Fortier, who was the city’s executive committee chair from 1998 to 2001 under mayor Pierre Bourque, is the candidate for Coalition Montreal, which has lost all but one of its council seats since the last election.

Bernard Gurberg, owner of the Dollar Cinema at Décarie Square, is running as an independent.

Fabrice Ntompa Ilunga, who attempted last year to start a provincial party with the objective of increasing the number of candidates from visible minority communities in politics, is running as an independent.

Tyler Lemco, a YouTuber who attracted attention when he put up fake campaign signs in 2015, is running as an independent.

Philippe Tessier, who has been identified in some publications as the “Communist League candidate for mayor of Montreal” is running as an independent. Gilbert Thibodeau, a former restaurateur who made several runs for municipal and federal office and ran for mayor of the Plateau Mont Royal borough with Coderre’s team in the last election, is running as an independent.

CITY/BOROUGH COUNCILS

Only the two main parties, Équipe Denis Coderre and Projet Montréal, have candidates for all 103 elected seats in Montreal.

Coalition Montréal has 17 city and borough council candidates in eight boroughs, including a full slate in Côte-des-Neiges–Notre-Dame-de-Grâce. Vrai changement pour Montréal, the party founded by Mélanie Joly before she ran federally, has no candidate for mayor but 20 candidates in six boroughs (leader Justine McIntyre is running for Pierrefonds-Roxboro borough mayor). There are also single-borough

parties led by incumbent mayors in Anjou, LaSalle and Lachine, and Plateau sans frontières, a party in Plateau-Mont-Royal led by author Michel Brûlé.

Including the five mayoral candidates, there are 30 people running as independents. A total of 298 are running for office in the city.

ON-ISLAND SUBURBS

Four incumbent mayors on the island of Montreal faced no opposition by Friday’s deadline and will be elected by acclamation: William Steinberg in Hampstead, Michel Gibson in Kirkland, Gisèle Chapleau in Île-Dorval and Philippe Roy (of the Action Mont-Royal party) in Town of Mount Royal.

TURNOUT

Only 47.2 per cent of eligible voters in Quebec exercised their right to vote in the last municipal elections in 2013. The Director General’s office will announce Monday a campaign encouraging more participation this time.

To see a list of candidates running in your municipality, go to electionsmunicipales.quebec. For Montreal, we have an interactive page listing candidates at montrealgazette.com.

Not sure which borough you live in? Go to the City of Montreal website, click on “boroughs” and type your postal code into the box on the right.