Montgomery and Fumagalli, 2 controversial Montreal borough mayors, lose their seats

Two borough mayoral incumbents who were kicked out of Projet Montréal lost their seats on Sunday.

Sue Montgomery, the mayor for Côte-Des-Neiges—Notre-Dame-De-Grâce and Giuliana Fumagalli, the mayor for Villeray—Saint-Michel—Parc-Extension, both lost after running as Independents.

In Côte-Des-Neiges—Notre-Dame-De-Grâce, Gracia Kasoki Katahwa of Projet Montréal squeaked out a victory in the mayoral race. She had 83 more votes with all polls reporting shortly before noon Tuesday.

Kasoki Katahwa beat out Lionel Perez, a candidate with Denis Coderre's Ensemble Montréal party.

On Sunday night, CBC/Radio-Canada had projected Perez as the winner.

Montgomery won the 2017 election under the Projet Montréal banner, but was kicked out of the party in January 2020 after harassment allegations against her chief of staff turned into a standoff with Plante. There have been political fireworks in the borough ever since.

Montgomery went on to form her own borough-based political party, running her former chief of staff in the Loyola district, but none of her candidates were able to gain the support of voters.

Three Projet councillors won their seats: Peter McQueen in his long-time NDG district, Despina Sourias in Loyola and Magda Popeanu in Côte-Des-Neiges.

Ensemble took two of the borough's districts: Sonny Moroz in Snowdon and Stephanie Valenzuela in Darlington.

Villeray—Saint-Michel—Parc-Extension

In Villeray—Saint-Michel—Parc-Extension, Projet's Laurence Lavigne Lalonde  unseated Fumagalli.

Fumagalli was booted from the Projet Montréal party in 2018 amid complaints of harassment made against her. An investigation by Montreal's comptroller found Fumagalli's behaviour violated workplace policy.

She, like Montgomery, formed her own borough based party.

Lalonde will be taking over Villeray—Saint-Michel—Parc-Extension, but she is not new to municipal politics. She was first elected as city councillor in the east end's Maisonneuve–Longue-Pointe district in 2013.

Lalonde has a background as a mental health worker before going abroad as a project manager for various international non-profit organizations.

Last week Montgomery and Fumagalli held a joint news conference, saying they were uniting for the election and calling on voters to support their borough-specific parties.