Letters to the editor

Conscience of the city stands with Wilson
From all accounts which I have heard so far it appears that Sean Wilson has a very good case against the city. Imagine being treated in such a manner by men with badges who have in fact (supposedly) been trained and commissioned to protect citizens from precisely the type of wanton aggression which Mr. Wilson and others claim he was subjected to. As for their alleged inability, refusal or unwillingness to communicate in English with Mr. Wilson, I am curious, when one of the officers in question said to Sean Wilson “See, that’s what you get for resisting arrest!”, did he say it in French or did he suddenly discover his inner bilingualism?

Mr. Wilson, the conscience of this city stands with you in your quest for justice and restitution, financial or otherwise. You will come out of this smarter, braver and stronger, although it seems to me that you were sufficiently all three prior to this incident. Hopefully, your response will also serve to more clearly evaluate as well as deter this alleged type of conduct. Please note, injustices happen. Paulo Coelho once wrote, “Everybody finds themselves in situations they do not deserve, usually when they are unable to defend themselves. Defeat often knocks at the warrior’s door. At such times, he remains silent. He does not waste energy on words, because they can do nothing. He knows it is best to use his strength to resist and have patience, knowing that someone is watching. Someone who saw the alleged unnecessary suffering and who will not accept it.” 
Robert Miller, Montreal

Blue bins achieving results
In his letter of Dec. 9, Eric Gralnick complains that the contents of his blue bin weren’t collected on Dec. 1 because the bin wasn’t facing the right way.

When residents received their new covered blue bins in June, the City of Côte St. Luc sent a colour flyer explaining, among other things, how to place the bin at the curb. We also explained that the mechanical arm that lifts the blue bins into the truck can only do so if the front of the bin is facing the street. This is the same for the 13 demerged municipalities that were part of the same contract as Côte St. Luc. Later, we sent another flyer reminding residents of this exact point. During the summer, our student Green Patrollers left notices on uncollected blue bins explaining why the contents weren’t collected. In September, we telephoned these residents to explain the same. We’ve also posted notices at Côte St. Luc City Hall and on our website.

With any new change to our residents’ day-to-day lives, there will be an adjustment period, however, the huge increase in Côte St. Luc’s diversion rate has shown that our citizens have embraced our new environmental initiatives. In one year, we’ve nearly doubled (up 91 percent) the amount of waste that is diverted from landfills through our blue and brown bin programs.

We encourage residents to continue to divert as much waste as possible to their blue and brown bins, as not only is it better for the environment, but it saves the city money. We estimate that if citizens recycled everything that was acceptable, it would save Côte St. Luc alone about $500,000 per year, money that could be used to renovate parks or repave roads.

I am surprised when a resident writes that “inmates are running the asylum” in our city. Côte St. Luc is a role model for its recycling programs and I feel we have done an excellent job to inform and educate. Given the level of service Côte St. Luc provides to residents, such comments are without merit.
Councillor Steven Erdely
City of Côte St. Luc

Duceppe stoops low on Polytechnique remembrance
Gilles Duceppe has set a new standard for how low one can stoop in the name of politics. To use the Harper government’s commemoration of the 20th anniversary of the École Polytechnique massacre by calling it “an insult to the victims and their families” is indecency that knows no bounds. And what clever trick did he have up his sleeve to use this most sombre and chilling and haunting memory of the 14 women shot down in cold blood on Dec. 6, 1989? To use the gun registry as his platform.

Just how exactly could Marc Lepine (Gamil Rodrique Gharbi) have been stopped from committing this heinous crime even with a gun registry? He purchased his Ruger-14 legally and registered it and in fact, he had even completed a firearms safety course. Everything a law-abiding citizen needs to do to register a gun was done.

But years of abuse and eventual abandonment by his Algerian father, a man totally contemptuous of women, cloned a son who turned into a woman-hater too. Registering a gun would not have saved a single life that day.

Let us always remember that sad and tragic day when the lives of 14 beautiful, intelligent, female engineering students were snuffed out way too soon.
Valerie Price
Montreal, QC

Parking, the lady and American Express
You may know me as the “parking meter lady” who wants a better system to support the needs of residents and merchants. Fortunately I have “an American Express” to cover “thousands” in parking meter fees and incidental tickets. Unfortunately all too many Montreal’s may not have the funds to cover much more than “the gas in their tank”.

I wish to draw attention to a fairer method of meter programming which saves the funds not used when “topping up” for more time. However, the city and its agent Stationnement Montreal are reluctant to do so.

With so few parking spaces and so many Bixi bike stands I find myself parking in the Gay Village and “Bixing” downtown to buy my husband underwear at The Bay. Gee whiz! Forgot my wallet, bike back to the car, remove the parking ticket and say “Forget it! My husband can go without underwear”

If only I could deduct these expenses from my income taxes. Sorry! No one has that privilege except our politicians extending themselves a tax free expense account. With empathy they tell us to take the bus which does not provide “on time service but will avoid the $52 ticket or the $330 towing fee”; If you object to infractions received, you can always “tell it to the judge” for an extra judicial and administration fee; but then again thank you American Express.

May I suggest a better, fairer and more appropriate idea. If you win a judicial contestation you should receive an amount equal to the total you risked for “flexing your democratic right”. This will make it less likely the courts will be overburdened in the future by frivolous cases initiated by the city police and its mandated agents.
Giovanna Giancaspro

End the municipal boondoggle
I noted that, when faced with demands from suburban mayors that Montreal alone pays for the consequences of its corrupt $600 million water meter deal, Mayor Tremblay laughed and said we were partners for better or for worse.

Strange. I don’t recall any suburb willingly entering a partnership with Montreal. Nor do I recall Montreal sharing any windfall with its captive “partners.” I do recall Tremblay balancing his budget on our backs by claiming shared downtown expenses, “downtown” being defined as beginning at Atwater and ending at Pie IX. I do recall Tremblay clawing away any tax rebates we were entitled to with Bill 22. I also recall Tremblay, furious at the demergers, downloading on us all costs of “improvements” made in our towns when we were boroughs; Beaconsfield was particularly hit by this one. And I recall that, on the first day of the merged mega-city, the fire stations from the former suburbs were literally raided, their state-of-the-art equipment paid for by suburban taxes seized and replaced by aging and, at times, useless equipment.

What I don’t recall is us willingly joining Montreal in a partnership. For that matter, even if we had, I don’t recall seeing a single drop of water from Montreal’s system. Not that I am not grateful for this; Dorval and Pointe Claire have the intelligence to add fluoride in their water while Montreal remains firmly entrenched in the 19th century. But we still  have to pay a water tax to Montreal and now this. Enough ! Suburban mayors should petition the Quebec government to dissociate us completely from Montreal regarding its drinking water. And if it refuses to do so, our mayors should refuse to pay for this boondoggle and take the matter to court.
André Bordeleau
Pointe Claire

Why the fuss?
I can’t understand what all the fuss is about over bonuses to bankers. Usually, if an employee makes money for the company, he is rewarded for it, so what is the big deal?

Well, the bankers made hundreds of billions of dollars in profits before the bubble burst, then they got another trillion dollars from the public purse when they came whining about how they would all lose their jobs if they weren’t bailed out; and now, a year later, the banks are showing a tidy, small profit again.

Not only that, they are still owed all the mortgage money from the poor patsies they suckered in the first place. No wonder they want a bonus.
But where is the bailout money for the patsies? I guess that since they are living in their cars, homeless shelters or under overpasses, they really don’t need it. Ah, Capitalism: it’s a great thing, if you are a banker.
Cliff Oswald
Pointe Claire

The flame and NDG
I’m not a sport type, but, I notice that the somewhat illogical rigamarole Olympic Flame so called race has totally by-passed NDG. Has NDG now disappeared from the map? Now, don’t tell me that CDN is the same, nor any of the fine neighbouring communities. Since my first arriving in NDG in 1926, I can assure you that any connections between NDG & CDN are at best tenuous. It was once only a tramway backlane and Décarie Street that joined them via Snowdon Ward.

I doubt the Olympic organizers have anything to do with this, but someone has some explaining to do.
Fred Leclaire,
NDG

The Dorchester question
I have been a reader of your newspaper for a while now, I find it a good read. The reason I’m writing to you now is simple. Amongst all the efforts to supposedly save the French language, I believe that the English language is actually being threatened. And the latest example that inspired me to write this is at one of Montreal’s historic sites: Dorchester Square. It’s a landmark that distinctly establishes the English culture in the City of Montreal. There are renovations being done on the Square, and more importantly on the monuments. Those monuments had the inscriptions written in English, and it seems as though now it’s to be written only in French, as if to somehow erase any trace that this city and province were equally founded by the English as well as French. I believe in bilingualism, and I fear that if we don’t make an issue out of this situation, and we allow the defacing of these monuments, then we’re allowing the erasure of the anglophone community in Quebec, and allowing the francophone nationalists to continue to lay claims to the non-existence of English history in Quebec.
Michele Fabio
Montreal