Quebec City Mayor Bruno Marchand will be joined by at least five other Quebec City officials as he travels to Scandinavian cities in March. They are allocated a sum of $36,000 to cover their expenses abroad.
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That figure, released in a public document Thursday morning, does not include spending by the mayor or his press secretary, who may also be accompanying him. It is therefore reasonable to assume that the bill for this foreign assignment could exceed the $40,000 mark and even approach the $50,000 mark.
The Vice-President of the Executive Committee, Pierre-Luc Lachance, will take part in the trip, as will Isabelle Dubois (Deputy Director-General, Planning, Mobility and Urban Security), Karine Breton (Deputy Director of the Mayor’s Office), Sébastien Goupil (Director of the Office for International Relations) and Catherine Labonté (International Relations Advisor).
“An amount of US$36,000 is to be provided for their airfare, ground travel, meals and lodging expenses,” the document reads. This is typically a maximum envelope. The bill may be lower, but an upward revision of the budget cannot be ruled out either. It would be enough to make a new decision.
This foreign mission focuses mainly on active mobility (bicycle network) and public transport in anticipation of the construction of a 19 km tram line in Quebec City in the coming years. The City of Quebec says it wants to learn from best practices abroad in wintry conditions, though the cities visited don’t get as much snow as the capital.
A stopover in Sweden too
Besides Copenhagen in Denmark and Helsinki (with its own tram) in Finland, between March 22nd and 31st we learn that the mayor will also travel to Malmö in Sweden, a city 45 minutes from Copenhagen. It should be noted that since 2014 the elected officials of Malmo have decided to invest in trambuses from the Belgian company Van Hool.
“The aim of this mission, coordinated by the International Relations Office of the City of Quebec, is to learn from and be inspired by cities that are recognized as true pioneers on a global scale in terms of: Mobility (active and integrated) and structuring of transport, strategy and measures to combat climate change, planning, urban design and sustainable living,” adds the Executive Committee’s summary.
Order criticized
For the opposition leader in City Hall, Claude Villeneuve, the cost of this mission is “much” too high, especially since he is anything but convinced of its relevance.
“It’s starting to get a lot of people. I personally remember missions by the Quebec Premier who had smaller delegations. We seem to be adding the business to justify the ride, but I don’t see the added value for Quebecers… Let’s be realistic, it’s not going to change what’s planned in the streetcar project. Everything is finalized,” he responded.
Équipe Priorité Québec (formerly Québec 21) chairman Patrick Paquet says the bill is “exorbitant”. According to him, there are at least two too many companions. “If they kidnap these two people, we’ll take their seats and go at our own expense! “, he falls, curious to personally assess the relevance of this mission on site.
He even invites the mayor to bring forward his trip because there will be practically no snow in Helsinki by the end of March, he stresses. Eventually, he suggests going to Ottawa instead, where the light rail’s winter troubles have made headlines multiple times since it began operating.
On Wednesday, the head of Transition Quebec, Jackie Smith, also sharply criticized this foreign assignment and lamented the expenditure of time, money and GHG (greenhouse gas). https://www.journaldequebec.com/2023/01/11/marchand-a-vancouver-pour-un-voyage-eclair
“You don’t have to be on a Helsinki tram to understand what works and what doesn’t. It is also not necessary to be photographed with happy cyclists in Copenhagen to know how to build a cycle lane network,” she reacted in a press release.