After more than 30 years in politics, Westmount Mayor Peter Trent stepping down

CTV Montreal: Trent steps down After over 30 years in politics, longtime Westmount Mayor Peter Trent will officially announce his retirement on Monday.

It’s the end of an era in Westmount, as longtime mayor Peter Trent will formally announce his retirement from politics on Monday.

“I don’t want to get stale, I don’t want to get crotchety,” said Trent. “I’ve done my time.”

Trent has severed as Westmount’s mayor for five terms, totaling almost 30 years – more than twice as long as any other mayor in the city’s history. He first entered politics in the 1980s. At the time, he was a successful businessman but decided to run for a seat on Westmount’s city council as a way to help preserve Westmount’s heritage homes and get the area’s municipal taxes under control.

“Over three years between 1981 and 1983, taxes had almost doubled,” he recalled.

Trent left the council after a single term to devote more time to his business but made a return less than two years later after getting a call from then-mayor Mae Cutler. Trent’s one-time political rival told him she wanted him to succeed her in the post.

“She said, ‘You’re the only person that could do this,’” Trent remembered. “I said, ‘But I asked you to resign publicly.’ She said she didn’t care.”

Trent won that position in the next election but there were clouds on the political horizon. Trent began to prepare for the issue that would arguably define his political legacy.

“We started hearing rumblings of ‘One Island, One City,’” he said. “I started gearing up for the fight of my life.”

On Jan. 1, 2002, the 28 municipalities on the island of Montreal were re-organized into a single megacity, the culmination of an effort by the then-ruling Parti Quebecois to completely alter the province’s municipal governing structure.

It was an unconscionable blow to Trent and other municipal mayors.

“We would be essentially eviscerated in terms of power,” he said. “Everything would be decided downtown.”

While some of Trent’s compatriots eventually gave in, setting their sights on positions in Montreal’s Executive Committee, Trent refused to back down.

“He was disappointed in a lot of the people he had worked with before that he felt had turned, even though they believed in the cities being separate,” said Trent’s wife, Kathryn Stephenson.

Trent enlisted Judge Lawrence Poitras to write a report on municipal demergers, a document that concluded breaking up the megacity would save money. Jean Charest, then leader of the Quebec Liberal Party, vowed that if he were elected premier he would allow the formerly independent cities to hold demerger referendums.

It was a winning strategy for Charest, who took power in 2003. In June 2004, Westmount voted overwhelmingly to demerge.

“I was over the moon,” said Trent. “I felt vindicated. I remember hugging everyone in sight. I don’t think they had ever seen me so emotional.”

Stephenson said Trent is still recognized as the man who saved several of Montreal’s cities.

“It’s lovely, actually,” she said. “People are always coming up to him and congratulating him on what he has accomplished for this lovely city.”

Now, Trent is stepping back. While his resignation will be effective as of Monday’s city council meeting, he will stay on as an advisor to the city’s interim mayor until elections are held in six months. He will leave with many memories of fights well fought in his decades of service.

“You have to have a sense of giving back to the community,” he said. “Trust me, it’s really, really worthwhile. I have enjoyed every bloody minute of it.”