Blanc-Sablon mayor turns to Facebook to shame residents who haven't paid taxes

The mayor of a village on Quebec's Lower North Shore has found an unusual way to prompt residents who haven't paid their municipal taxes: He's published their names on Facebook.

Blanc-Sablon Mayor Armand Joncas says the municipality recovered $20,000 in unpaid taxes the day after it posted the names on the social media site. 

"This year we had no choice, with $1.4 million in taxes, and at the end of the year we were still missing $200,000," he said.​

Joncas added that in the absence of local newspapers in Blanc-Sablon, he decided with his municipal council to publish this information online.

The move prompted angry residents to attend the council meeting Tuesday night.

Municipal authorities even had to request the presence of the Sûreté du Québec, but the police did not have to intervene.

"Everyone has the right to go to the municipal office and see who pays taxes and who does not pay ... but to publish it on Facebook, I find it disgusting," said Anthony Dumas, a former mayor of Blanc-Sablon.

Joncas said publishing the names of those who haven't paid their taxes on Facebook is legal, citing article 1023 of Quebec's municipal code, which states that the municipal treasurer must submit the names of those who haven't paid taxes, at council's request, by Dec. 20 of any given year. 

But Pierre Trudel, a law professor at l'Université de Montréal, said that doesn't give municipalities the right to publish private information about its citizens.

Trudel said the residents whose information was made public could complain to Quebec's Access to Information Commission.