The mayoral campaign in Brossard has taken a turn for the nasty over accusations one of the candidates is ineligible.
Jean-Marc Pelletier, the candidate for the Renouveau Brossard party, has found himself accused of not having lived in the city long enough to serve. To be eligible, candidates must have had their primary residence in the city for a full year before being elected.
Pelletier dismissed the allegations, saying he had lived in the area for decades and had previously served as mayor between 2006 and 2009. Still, acknowledged having lived in Montreal for several years and still maintaining a home there, one which he is working on selling.
“The law says you have to be a resident in the city for at least 12 months,” he said. “I’ve been a resident since July 2016. For the past six months, I’ve been domiciled in Brossard.”
“I’ve been living in Brossard for 30 years,” he added. “We moved to Montreal for some reasons and now we’re in the process of moving back, but I’ve been a resident in Brossard of over one year and a half.”
Opponent Hoang Mai cast doubts on those claims.
“The law says you have to be here for at least 12 months,” he said. “I think you have to have a connection, you have to be legitimate. If people are asking questions, that’s a problem… It’s unfortunate that at this stage of the elections, we’re still asking some questions.”
There’s precedent for such a dispute in Quebec municipal politics. In 2013, when Marc Demers was running for mayor of Laval, it was found he hadn’t been living there for a full 12 months prior to the election. However, a judge ruled he was eligible to run as he’d lived in Laval for 35 years before moving. Demers won the election that year, but the law was changed afterward, meaning a Pelletier win could be challenged in court.
Until that happens, Pelletier said he’s going to focus on his message of lowering taxes and will not be seeking any kind of redress in court.
“It’s not a matter of suing, that’s too dirty to get involved in that mess,” he said.
