THE METHODOLOGY

Each year, Montreal forecasts in

its capital works program how much it expects to spend to repair roads the following year. But when the year is over, the city doesn’t report in its annual financial statements how much of that forecast it actually spent. The capital works program separates the city’s projected investments in roads, sewers, water mains and other infrastructure into “protection” (meaning repair of existing infrastructure) and “development” (meaning new infrastructure). But the audited financial statements, the only true and accurate report of what the city spent in the previous year, do not. Instead, the financial statements lump spending on repair and new construction together into a global figure. The city refused the Montreal Gazette’s interview request with the bureaucrat in charge of road repair. The newspaper was left to use the following methodology to calculate the city’s annual roadwork spending: Calculate the percentage of overall roadwork investment earmarked as “protection” in the capital works program in a given year. It was usually around 70 to 75 per cent, but could vary wildly — such as 85 per cent in 2008 and 48.7 per cent in 2012. Apply the same percentage to the global roadwork investment figure in the annual audited financial statements that were presented for that year. The figures — all adjusted to current dollars — are revealing: When Gérald Tremblay was elected mayor in 2002, his administration spent less on road repair across the island than was spent on the same territory before the municipal mergers. Tremblay then increased city road repair spending — from $86.55 million in 2003 to $130.87 million in 2004. It barely changed in 2005. Tremblay bumped up spending — to $162.34 million — in 2006, the year his administration instituted a road repair tax. But then Tremblay decreased it — to $146.33 million — in 2007. (The city had established in 2005 that it needed to spend what comes to $272.7 million in current dollars each year just to keep roads in their current condition. This was raised in 2010 to $370.4 million.) Tremblay increased spending to $213.85 million in 2008 and $220.96 million in 2009, with all of the roadwork outsourced to private firms. The city was then hit with corruption scandals, and road spending plummeted — and it remained at or below pre-merger levels well into Denis Coderre’s time as mayor. For example, it fell to $57.41 million in 2011. In 2014, under Coderre, it was $100.86 million. In 2015, Coderre increased spending to $149.03 million — about the same as 2007. With the advent of Coderre’s “cosmetic” road repair programs, city spending shot up — to $254.46 million in 2016 and $347.49 million in 2017.