As I begin my fourth mandate as a city councillor in Côte Saint-Luc, I look forward to serving my constituents in District 2 while overseeing the portfolios assigned to me by Mayor Mitchell Brownstein: Communications and IT, Animal Protection and Sponsorship. Like all elected officials, I will also chair and co-chair some special events.
It was former Mayor Anthony Housefather who introduced the portfolio system in 2005. This works well, allowing councillors to have significant input while collaborating with staff on different dossiers.
I serve as Communications and Marketing Specialist for the English Montreal School Board by day, so returning this portfolio which I oversaw from 2005 to 2013 is kind of a natural. The landscape has changed and we must deal with the reality of social media and the many Facebook pages covering our community. We especially encourage people to join our new page called Your CSL. Here is the link. In early 2018 our website will be revamped and thematic newsletters produced. I intend to work with every one of our departments to ensure our messages are going out correctly. As for Animal Protection, I am proud to have established the Côte Saint-Luc Cats Committee eight years ago. Work on that area will naturally continue, but I believe a big focus will be placed on dogs. Should we allow dogs on leashes in more parks? How are our dog runs being best utilized? In regards to sponsorship, we have brought in a lot more outside corporate support in recent years for different events and programs and I hope to see that continue. I am especially proud of the Pierre Brunet McDonald’s Parks and Recreation Bursary Program we launched last summer. Almost $9,000 has been collected, which we will distribute to individuals and families in need of subsidies to take part in some of our programs.
The other portfolios are:
Oren Sebag, a Registered Nurse by education, takes on Public Safety and Volunteer Citizens on Patrol.
Dida Berku gets Urban Planning, Citizen Engagement and Central City and Transportation. She will also chair the Planning Advisory Committee (PAC).
Steven Erdelyi keeps Finance and Environment and chairs the Audit Committee
Mitchell Kujavsky gets Engineering, the Côte Saint-Luc Dramatic Society and sits on the Audit Committee
David Tordjman takes on Library and Culture and Traffic. He will also sit on PAC.
Sidney Benizri continues with Intecommunity Relations and adds Public Works.
Ruth Kovac moves to Park and Recreation and Seniors and sits on PAC.
Mayor Brownstein will oversee Human Resources and Legal Affairs.
Of course I want to wish our three former councillors, Glenn J. Nashen, Allan J. Levine and Sam Goldbloom well. I am sure each one of them will remain involved with our community.
