MONTREAL – One Tremblay is gone, and another has returned.
Former city councillor Marcel Tremblay, brother of ex-Montreal mayor Gérald Tremblay, has returned to the city, this time as an employee of Côte-des-Neiges-Notre-Dame-de-Grâce borough.
The borough confirmed on Thursday that it hired Tremblay, who was a city councillor in the borough from 2002 to 2009, on an 11-month contract that will pay him $60,000 to work as support staff for the borough’s elected officials.
His contract will end at the time of the next Montreal municipal election.
Montreal Mayor Michael Applebaum suggested Tremblay for the position after he vacated his seat of borough mayor of Côte-des-Neiges-N.D.G. to become interim mayor of the city on Nov. 16, borough spokesperson Michel Therrien said.
City council elected Applebaum by secret ballot that day to replace Gérald Tremblay, who resigned as Montreal’s mayor amid scandal on Nov. 5.
Marcel Tremblay was spotted at city hall for the vote.
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He and Applebaum served together in brother Gérald’s Union Montreal party.
“It’s Michael who thought of Mr. Tremblay,” Therrien said, adding that Marcel Tremblay does not intend to run for office again.
“The reason is that when Michael Applebaum found himself mayor of Montreal rather rapidly, rather suddenly, there was senior staff of the borough that followed him to the city. So we were left with a deficit of senior staff. … It isn’t easy to find staff for a set period of time.”
Tremblay was hired because of his experience and knowledge of the borough, Therrien added, adding he started on Nov. 21.
“Until Michael comes back as borough mayor.”
Applebaum has said he will not seek election as Montreal mayor next year, but rather run in the borough.
Applebaum quit Union Montreal this month after its caucus chose Richard Deschamps over him as its candidate to run for interim mayor.
Applebaum ran as an independent and beat Deschamps.
Three of the borough’s five remaining councillors also quit Union Montreal to sit as independents and support Applebaum’s bid for interim city mayor.
They include Lionel Perez, who was elected by acclamation to replace Applebaum as interim borough mayor last week.
Perez was not available to comment on Marcel Tremblay’s hire, Therrien said.
Tremblay’s job is to assist all of the borough’s elected officials, answer the public and “ensure the transition, so that business continues,” Therrien said.
“I definitely think it’s a little strange and a little absurd,” Peter McQueen, the borough’s lone opposition Projet Montréal city councillor, said, adding that a civil servant should not be partisan.
“I don’t know what to make of it because I just don’t see how he can be impartial. Obviously, I’m not going to trust him.”
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