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A Projet Montréal administration will abolish the position of borough mayor, a political and institutional by-product of the dismantling of the city of Montreal into 19 local fiefdoms. The provincial government has implicitly admitted that the borough mayoralties were a mistake by changing the charter of the city of Montreal to make the mayor of Montreal automatically also the mayor of the borough of Ville-Marie. That still leaves 18 mayors too many. The best solution is to reinstate the position of borough president, which existed from 2001 to 2005, and for which a borough councillor is chosen by his or her peers. This will put an end to the excesses observed in the 2005 to 2009 period. This commitment requires modifications to the city's charter, and must therefore receive the approval of the provincial government. Projet Montréal also pledges increased cooperation between boroughs, both for day-to- day operations, such as snow-clearing on major arteries, and for projects of greater scope near or at the borders between boroughs. More broadly, Projet Montréal will rise above partisanship to coordinate the activities of neighbouring boroughs.

Citizens have taken enthusiastically to their borough councils, which not only deal with local issues touching their everyday lives, but whose meetings are held close to their homes, and are more welcoming than those of the city council. Too often, however, citizens raising questions at their borough councils are told that they aren't asking at the right level, and that their question is in fact under the jurisdiction of the central city or the executive committee. Such a response is frustrating to anyone who has made the effort to come to a borough council meeting, and is made even more frustrating by the fact that the person who is telling them that their question is out of order often sits on city council or on the executive committee. Through this streamlining of the democratic process, borough representatives will be obliged to accept the citizen's question, make the necessary inquiries, and then to follow through with the answer at a later borough council meeting.

A Projet Montréal administration will create neighbourhood councils so that citizens can participate fully in the development of their local environment. Each one of these councils will cover at most one electoral district, and sometimes an even smaller area. As is the case in Quebec City, these councils will organise public hearings, mobilise and encourage cooperation among the neighbourhood's residents and organisations, and develop projects to improve the quality of life of residents. The municipal and borough councils will consult them on issues such as planning, community life and public security. Neighbourhood councils will be made up of ten or so citizens and the local councillor.

Projet Montréal will replace the urban agglomeration council by a single municipal council, which will be made up of all 65 Montreal councillors, as well as the mayors of 14 of the 15 other municipalities on the Island of Montreal (the exception being Dorval Island). Due to its size, Dollard-des-Ormeaux will receive an additional representative, resulting in an 80-person city council. This change requires the approval of the Quebec government. In the event that the province refuses to agree to this change, Projet Montréal will propose that the agglomeration council be made up of Montreal's 65 elected officials, as well as representatives of the demerged municipalities, and that its operation involve the creation of standing committees corresponding to the council's principal responsibilities. These committees will be made up of agglomeration councillors. They will have open meetings, and will report to the agglomeration council.

A Projet Montréal administration will progressively transfer the executive committee's responsibilities to standing committees of city council. Each standing committee will be made up of at least five councillors, in such a way as to reflect party representation on city council. The standing committees will deal with responsibilities currently shared by the members of the executive committee, including drawing up the city's budget. Each member of the executive committee will be the chair of the corresponding standing committee. Committees' reports and recommendations will be submitted to the executive committee, which will put every proposition on the agenda of the next council meeting. The city council will thereby become the only body with the authority to act on the recommendation of a standing committee. Collaborating within the standing committees will enable councillors to work towards a consensus, avoiding the current sterile culture of confrontation. This commitment does not require the approval of the provincial government, since the powers and responsibilities of executive committee as laid out in the city charter are formally preserved.

To encourage citizens to participate in the governance of their city, a consultative committee will be constituted for each standing committee of council. These consultative committees will be made up of citizens, and will present their reports publicly and regularly at the meetings of the appropriate standing committee.

To ensure greater transparency, a Projet Montréal administration will require that the executive committee and the standing committees meet openly, and that their deliberations be broadcast, except under circumstances already specified in city regulations. The dates and agendas of meetings will be posted on the city's web site at least one week before the meetings are held, and verbatim transcripts and video recordings of meetings will afterwards be posted on the web. Furthermore, Projet Montréal will strengthen the mandate of the ombudsman to deal with complaints relating to the transparency of city governance.

After four years of working within the governance framework established in 2005, the time has come to consider how to improve it. To this end, Projet Montréal will mandate one of the standing committees of city council to examine the whole of Montreal's political system, and will also give Montreal's public consultation office a mandate to ensure the widest possible participation in the governance of the city on the part of the citizenry. This reexamination will be a priority, and will touch upon the following issues:

• The sharing of responsibilities between the central city and the boroughs.
• The electoral system of the city and its boroughs. Projet Montréal is in favour of a system of proportional representation at the municipal level and wants it worked into a municipal governance overhaul. In effect, over the next few years, Montreal will have no choice but to reconsider issues such as the number of members of city council, the number of districts and boroughs, the role and powers of the members of each borough council and their representation on city council, and a redrawing of electoral districts to take into account natural boundaries between neighbourhoods in accordance with demographic considerations.
• The financing of political parties.

Following this process, the city of Montreal will send the provincial government a list of proposals for changes to the city charter. The outcome of the negotiations between the city and the government will be put into effect after the municipal elections of 2013.

Projet Montréal will implement the policy "For an egalitarian participation of men and women in the life of Montreal" (Pour une participation égalitaire des femmes et des hommes à la vie de Montréal, 2008). The city of Montreal adopted this policy but not the means of applying it. A Projet Montréal administration will allocate the resources needed to implement it, and will go a step further by taking steps to ensure gender parity among the officials elected to city or borough council or nominated to positions on city committees.

Projet Montréal pledges to implement a participatory budget, based on experiments both in Montreal and elsewhere in the world, so that the population can determine budgetary priorities and the corresponding allocation of the city's financial resources. Participatory budgeting will be applied at every level: borough councils, city council, and agglomeration council. It will cover the whole of the budget, namely both the operations budget and the investment budget.

The right of citizens to participate will be recognised as such in the Charter of Rights and Responsibilities, and this charter will in turn be incorporated into the City Charter.

Following the lead of several other cities, a Projet Montréal administration will study the possibility of allowing permanent residents and refugees to vote in Montreal municipal elections, provided they can prove residence in Montreal for at least 6 months.
This measure requires the approval of both the provincial and federal governments.

Request that the Government of Quebec establish an investigative unit (like Ontario's Special Investigations Unit) that is not part of any police force and which will automatically investigate whenever a civilian is killed in a police operation.

The City is a public administration that manages $4 billion a year, $5 billion if one includes the Montreal Transit Corporation. The diversity of its responsibilities and the particular conditions under which certain services are delivered often necessitate the involvement of the private sector. To take the most obvious example, the City could not logically purchase an extra 1,000 heavy trucks that would be used only four or five times a year for snow-clearing operations. Moreover, it is perfectly desirable for the public and private sectors to share certain tasks so that their performance may be compared. Emulation and healthy competition between the two help bring about improved practices.

City contracts are currently awarded to the lowest bidder meeting all requirements of a call for tenders. The emphasis is almost exclusively on the price of a bid. The practice encourages companies to cut quality, pay little heed to certain obligations, such as providing adequate security for roadwork operations, or perform their work as quickly as possible. The way in which contracts are awarded at present does not allow the City to impose penalties on certain types of behaviour that can have harmful consequences not only for residents' safety, but also on the lifespan of the public works carried out.

Projet Montréal will reform the way in which contracts are awarded by implementing the following changes:

• The City will define the qualification criteria so as to base them on a company's past performance (see previous commitment) and on its contribution to major societal goals such as environmental performance (e.g., materials used, energy efficiency, less polluting vehicles) and social performance (e.g., gender parity in the company and/or among project participants; presence of cultural minorities within the company and/or among other project participants; social economy);
• Companies participating in a bid will have to submit two envelopes to the City, one containing information on criteria for qualification, the other containing a price.
• The City will initially open only the envelopes containing information about qualification criteria. Those that do not meet certain minimum requirements in this regard will be set aside, as will those with a poor performance file.
• The City will then open the envelopes containing a price from among the remaining companies, that is those whose bids meet the qualification criteria and which have an acceptable performance file.

Set up a permanent joint squad made up of the police and the city auditor general's department so as to detect signs of collusion among companies bidding on calls for tenders issued by the City.

When upgrading or renewing software and in calls for tender, favour the use of free open source software and open standards. Where possible, plan for the progressive replacement of proprietary software with free, open source software by requiring each city department to develop a strategy for its use.

Ensure that detailed information on the City and its administration is available to residents (with source files provided in standard, open-data format) and that city and borough websites respect universal accessibility standards.