Michael Fainstat, a longtime Montreal city councillor and founding member of the Montreal Citizens' Movement, is being remembered as one of the city's most respected local politicians.
Fainstain died on Dec. 29 after a lengthy battle with Parkinson's disease. He was 87.
Fainstat, who represented N.D.G on city council for 17 years during the 1970s and 1980s, is credited with bringing greater transparency to municipal politics.
Arnold Bennett was elected alongside Fainstat under the new Montreal Citizens' Movement banner in 1974.
"He was absolutely rock solid on issues of ethics, governance and democracy," Bennett said. "Not only in opposition, but when he was on city's executive committee."
Fainstat served in opposition while Jean Drapeau was mayor, and later, as the right-hand man to Mayor Jean Doré when the MCM won the 1986 election in a landslide.
"For 12 years I've been pregnant," Fainstat said the night of that historic election win, "and tonight we've given birth."
Fainstat was Doré's chairman of the executive committee from 1986 to 1990.
"If it wasn't for his support and extraordinary library on urban affairs that he collected in his basement, I would have never run as mayor," Doré said.
Fainstat's biggest legacy was likely opening up Montreal city hall to the public and instituting a way for citizens to question their elected representatives at municipal council.
"At the time of Jean Drapeau you couldn't go to city hall, everything was closed," said former municipal councillor Michel Prescott. "So he was certainly part of that democratic process."
And as far as Bennett is concerned, Fainstat's influence was a bright spot on the local political scene, and left an indelible mark that will live on in spite of his passing.
"That (Doré) administration, if you look back over the last 20 years, basically stands up as a clean period in Montreal history," Bennett said.
A funeral service will be held January 9 at the Mount Royal Funeral Complex.
