Brownsburg-Chatham makes first move to strip SDEBC of its power

The debate surrounding the Société de développement économique de Brownsburg-Chatham (SDEBC), a non-profit and independently-managed organization that administers or owns some of the municipality's properties, continued to escalate at the most recent council meeting on Monday, December 6.

In a contested motion that ultimately had to be voted upon, council members approved a resolution to inform the SDEBC that the municipality was ending the property development contract which allowed the non-profit organization to manage the sale of municipal properties and lands.

The municipality had previously acquired several million square feet of land, following the approval of Bill 212 in the Quebec National Assembly, which was divided into lots that the previous administration included in the assessment registry under the SDEBC's name.

The motion, presented by Councillor Serge Riendeau and seconded by Councillor Richard Boyer, was approved by a 4-2 vote, with councillors Paule Blain Clotteau and André McNicoll in opposition.

At the previous month's council meeting, Clotteau was removed, through a council vote she also opposed, from her position as the municipality's representative on the SDEBC committee, and replaced by Riendeau.

Clotteau was equally a former member of the SDEBC, in addition to being a councillor under the two administrations of the past five years.

During this month's question period, resident Jean-Sébastien Patrice questioned Mayor Georges Dinel about the reason for Clotteau's removal. The mayor replied that she was in favour of the SDEBC, something the majority of council members did not agree with.

"So the idea is to dismantle the SDEBC?" Patrice asked.

Dinel replied, "With time, yes. [...] We want to break away from it."

To that effect, the resolution passed last week - which according to the municipal resolution became effective Friday, December 10 - cites article 4.2 of the property development contract whereby "the municipality can end the agreement [in which the SDEBC manages the sale of the acquired lots] with just cause."

According to Clotteau, however, the municipality does not have the authority to remove this power from the SDEBC as the non-profit organization is mandated by a government charter.

Reached this week, SDEBC president Daniel Campeau said the development society administration decided last Thursday to fight the municipality in court.

"I still haven't received the signed resolution in my hands, as of today," he told The Review in a telephone interview. "However, in light of the resolution passed at the meeting last week, [SDEBC members] met last Thursday and decided we would seek the advice of a lawyer in defending ourselves against the municipality."

He added the municipality does not have "just cause," as stated under article 4.2, to end the agreement.

'Conflict' between municipality and SDEBC

"I find it regrettable, this conflict between the municipal council and the SDEBC," Clotteau said, referring to accusations of poor fiscal management made against members of the non-profit organization. "These members have worked for three years, as volunteers, and now [the council] wants to push them out."

In similar vein, Riendeau made reference to such a conflict when he stated that he had not received a letter from the SDEBC welcoming him to his new post as the municipal representative on that committee.

"We can see there is a clear conflict between the municipality and the development society," he said.

In addition to handling the sale of municipal lands, the SDEBC's mandate included the management of the Louis-Renaud building - a subject which was equally raised during public question period.

The construction of the building, which was completed in 2007, was initially approved without having been subject to the legal call for tenders. In the supposed contract, the municipality was to rent the building from the contractors for a period of 20 years, after which they could purchase the building for one dollar.

According to Clotteau, however, it was later discovered that the contract implied that the building would never belong to the municipality. The municipality would have therefore been left to pay $865,000 in rent without any possibility of ownership.

At this point, she continued, the municipality asked the SDEBC to pay for the building, at a cost of $465,000, and rent it out to the municipality on a monthly basis over a five-year period - as is currently being done.

The agreement, in principle, is that the SDEBC will transfer the property to Brownsburg-Chatham after the $465,000 has been paid back. However, no such documentation exists to this effect.

Dinel highlighted this at the meeting: "We have no document that states the building would return to the municipality, and the non-profit organization (SDEBC) is completely separate from the municipality. This was an operation decided [under the previous administration] in 2007."

Adding to such woes, both Clotteau and Dinel mentioned, the building was poorly constructed and is in great need of repairs, ones which the municipality can hardly afford.