MONTREAL —
The spotlight has turned to Denis Coderre’s business dealings — and if there’s a conflict of interest — as election day nears in Montreal.
Coderre released new information Wednesday about work he did in the private sector between 2017 and 2021, following his tenure as mayor.
One of his recent clients was revealed as COGIR, a real estate company that was in the news in August when city councillor Marvin Rotrand told reporters he believed the company was skirting the law by evicting waves of people in the neighbourhood of Côte-des-Neiges, something the company said was a mistake.
“All these questions, people are asking. What does it mean when you are working for a promoter, yourself? What does it mean?” asked incumbent mayor Valérie Plante.
Coderre responded he would recuse himself from city business with COGIR if elected.
“Anything regarding housing and them, I’ll pull out,” he said.
Commercial printing and specialty media company TC Transcontinental has also confirmed it is the mystery company that worked with Coderre prior to his municipal campaign run.
“At Denis Coderre’s request and in the public interest, TC Transcontinental is lifting its confidentiality agreement and confirming that it had retained Denis Coderre to provide strategic advice on the company’s circular economy and recycling investments in Montreal’s east end,” said François Taschereau, vice president of corporate communications and public affairs. “The company will not comment further on this matter.”
According to TC Transcontinental, Coderre held contracts with it from July 2019 to March 2020, as well as from November 2020 to March 2021.
Information uncovered by La Presse reveals the former mayor’s mandate was related to the publisac, a collection of flyers distributed to every home in the Greater Montreal area.
The City of Montreal has already expressed its interest in limiting the publisac’s distribution, stating it is too difficult to recycle.
CONFLICT OF INTEREST?
The Lobbyist Registry shows that since 2019, TC Transcontinental has been trying to stop the City of Montreal from passing a municipal bylaw that would establish an “opt-in” system for the publisac.
Under this system, those wanting to receive the bundle of flyers would have to sign up.
The registry notes the company wants to “ensure that the publisac distribution system is preserved in its current form and reject a possible municipal regulatory proposal to establish an ‘opt-in’ system.”
According to the Lobbyist Registry, the company is hoping to solve this problem by “guid[ing] public policy and funding requests” to buy equipment to sort plastics “at a plant yet to be determined.”
“This equipment would improve the current recycling of residual plastic bales from the sorting centres, with the aim of maximizing the outlets and thus monetizing this deposit,” the document states.
When asked about potential conflicts of interest, Coderre affirmed he plans to take any issues to the ethics board.
WHY THE SECRECY?
Wednesday, Coderre revealed the list of eight companies he has worked with over the last four years amid mounting pressure over the supposed secrecy.
In addition to COGIR and TC Transcontinental, his contracts include work with real-estate company, Stingray, Felix & Paul Studios, Parc Omega, the Jewish General Hospital, Eurostar and the International Automobile Federation, which governs the Formula One.
According to his statement of revenue, Coderre’s contracts pulled in $458,263 last year and he paid $187,850 in federal and provincial taxes.
TORONTO – One expert predicts Ottawa‘s changes to mortgage rules will help spur demand among potential homebuyers but says policies aimed at driving new supply are needed to address the “core issues” facing the market.
The federal government’s changes, set to come into force mid-December, include a higher price cap for insured mortgages to allow more people to qualify for a mortgage with less than a 20 per cent down payment.
The government will also expand its 30-year mortgage amortization to include first-time homebuyers buying any type of home, as well as anybody buying a newly built home.
CIBC Capital Markets deputy chief economist Benjamin Tal calls it a “significant” move likely to accelerate the recovery of the housing market, a process already underway as interest rates have begun to fall.
However, he says in a note that policymakers should aim to “prevent that from becoming too much of a good thing” through policies geared toward the supply side.
Tal says the main issue is the lack of supply available to respond to Canada’s rapidly increasing population, particularly in major cities.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Sept. 17,2024.
OTTAWA – The Canadian Real Estate Association says the number of homes sold in August fell compared with a year ago as the market remained largely stuck in a holding pattern despite borrowing costs beginning to come down.
The association says the number of homes sold in August fell 2.1 per cent compared with the same month last year.
On a seasonally adjusted month-over-month basis, national home sales edged up 1.3 per cent from July.
CREA senior economist Shaun Cathcart says that with forecasts of lower interest rates throughout the rest of this year and into 2025, “it makes sense that prospective buyers might continue to hold off for improved affordability, especially since prices are still well behaved in most of the country.”
The national average sale price for August amounted to $649,100, a 0.1 per cent increase compared with a year earlier.
The number of newly listed properties was up 1.1 per cent month-over-month.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Sept. 16, 2024.
MONTREAL – Two Quebec real estate brokers are facing fines and years-long suspensions for submitting bogus offers on homes to drive up prices during the COVID-19 pandemic.
Christine Girouard has been suspended for 14 years and her business partner, Jonathan Dauphinais-Fortin, has been suspended for nine years after Quebec’s authority of real estate brokerage found they used fake bids to get buyers to raise their offers.
Girouard is a well-known broker who previously starred on a Quebec reality show that follows top real estate agents in the province.
She is facing a fine of $50,000, while Dauphinais-Fortin has been fined $10,000.
The two brokers were suspended in May 2023 after La Presse published an article about their practices.
One buyer ended up paying $40,000 more than his initial offer in 2022 after Girouard and Dauphinais-Fortin concocted a second bid on the house he wanted to buy.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Sept. 11, 2024.
