PLANTE MAKES HISTORY
‘Our city is stronger when we work together,’ mayor-elect tells supporters
A year ago, she was unknown to most Montrealers.
On Sunday, she became the city’s first female mayor.
Valérie Plante’s meteoric rise to the city’s top job was as remarkable as it seemed unlikely just a year ago, when she wasn’t even considered a top contender to take the helm of Projet Montréal.
“We made history together. We did it together,” Plante told a jubilant crowd of supporters at the Corona Theatre in Little Burgundy Sunday night.
“Tonight, we wrote a new page in Montreal’s history. Three hundred and seventy five years after Jeanne Mance co-founded the city, Montreal has its first woman mayor. And I’m excited to write the continuation of this history with all of you.”
She thanked supporters, and pledged to work hard to bring all of Montreal’s communities together.
“I believe that our city is stronger when we work together,” Plante said. “I also believe that we move this city forward when we work together.”
If there’s anything to be learned about Plante’s short political career, it’s that she shines in the underdog position.
She burst onto the municipal scene in a surprise win only four years ago when she defeated former longtime provincial Municipal Affairs Minister Louise Harel in downtown’s Sainte-Marie district.
Then 11 months ago, Plante upset longtime party member Guillaume Lavoie by only 69 votes to take the party leadership.
Going into the campaign, the obscure Plante was seen to be over her head against the larger-thanlife Denis Coderre, especially since Montreal had not had a one-term mayor in nearly 60 years when Sarto Fournier lost the 1960 election to Jean Drapeau.
Throughout the campaign, voters continually mentioned they like Plante’s warm smile and positive attitude, seen as a tonic to the brooding Coderre.
However, she trailed Coderre by 14 percentage points back in June. She narrowed that to 11 points by August.
In the final weeks of the campaign, Plante and Coderre were in a statistical dead heat in polls.
Luc Ferrandez, Projet Montréal’s interim leader until last December, credits Plante’s personality and positive attitude.
“She succeeded in getting known with ambitious proposals and a scintillating and vibrating personality,” Ferrandez said Sunday night. “She’s plugged into Montrealers and she succeeded in reinventing Projet Montréal. It’s a real feat.”
Marc-André Marquis was a volunteer in Plante’s 2013 campaign and her leadership bid. He agreed that Plante’s personality is her greatest asset.
“There is no politician in Quebec who has a personality as magnetic as Valérie Plante,” Marquis said. “We feel she is there for the right reasons; because she wants to help people.”
But not only did Plante captivate Montrealers in this campaign, Projet Montréal shed its image as a fringe anti-car party promising tramways across the island, after 12 years in the political wilderness as the opposition in city hall.
Plante started the campaign early, in the summer, meeting Montrealers all around the city.
She held daily news conferences starting in August to outline her party’s platform, and to denounce what she characterized as Coderre’s extravagant spending and autocratic style.
While the party stands for more active citizen participation, safer streets and decentralizing power to the boroughs, perhaps the promise that gained the most attention was one Plante came up with during her leadership campaign last year to build a Pink Line in the Montreal métro.
It called for a $6-billion, 21-kilometre line to link Montreal North to Lachine, passing through downtown and Notre-Dame-de-Grâce. She said the new line would ease pressure on the crowded Orange Line.
However, when Coderre was asked about the line, he laughed at it, and later said Plante would never be able to build such a project, saying it would cost three or even four times more than Projet Montréal’s estimates.