This year’s party at Centre de la nature ran two days for city’s 60th anniversary
Although many kids who visited the Centre de la nature for the city’s Fête de la famille on Labour Day weekend were probably still primed for action by the end of the day, a lot of parents were more likely to have been exhausted and ready to hit the sack by the time it was all over.
It is a measure of the sheer vastness of the city’s largest outdoor park in Laval’s Duvernay district that it’s difficult to visit the place from end to end over the space of a few hours without coming away in a state of at least partial exhaustion.
Unless, of course, you have the inexhaustible energy of a growing child.
Animated “plant people” walking the grounds at Laval’s Centre de la nature in east-end Duvernay during the Fête de la famille on Labor Day weekend attracted hundreds of children like bees drawn to colorful flowers. (Photo: Martin C. Barry, Laval News)
The Zip Line at this year’s Fête de la famille at the Centre de la nature attracted children as well as adults. (Photo: Martin C. Barry, Laval News)
Saturday a washout
Among the many moms, dads and kids taking in the ambience on Sunday afternoon were Jason and his two pre-school kids from Laval’s Sainte-Dorothée district. While it was not their first time visiting the nature park, it was their first foray onto the vast grounds during a Fête de la famille celebration.
One of the many wandering acrobatic performers at Laval’s two-day celebration of families at the Centre de la nature. (Photo: Martin C. Barry, Laval News)
While Saturday may have been a rainy washout for some who’d planned to attend the first day of the outdoor celebration, the good news was that all-day sunshine prevailed on Sunday.
The city decided to stage a two-day celebration this year, instead of a single day as usual, given fact that 2025 is the 60th anniversary of the City of Laval’s founding in 1965. With an emphasis on sports and games, there was a multitude of activities, shows and hosted activities for children as well as adults.
Fun for everybody
Among the many fun things to do were an overhead Zip Line, a climbing wall, a dance workshop, sports challenges, an exposition of public works heavy equipment, members of the Laval Rocket hockey team, officers from the Laval Police with their mascot Flair, BMX stunt bike riding and an initiation to pumptrack cycling.
There were also science workshops, nature talks and exhibits, a mobile library, giant games, digital challenges with the Laval public library’s Espace numérique, an exposition of archeological artifacts, and a section about animal protection.
Among the many moms, dads and kids taking in the ambience on Sunday afternoon were Jason and his two pre-school kids from Laval’s Sainte-Dorothée district. (Photo: Martin C. Barry, Laval News)
Pledges to de-emphasize big-ticket projects, unlike some of his predecessors at Laval City Hall
Unlike several mayoralty candidates who were seeking re-election in Quebec’s third-largest city over the past few decades, incumbent Laval mayor Stéphane Boyer will not be dangling the prospect of flashy new projects – like Place Bell or the Aquatic Complex, as his predecessors did – when he’s out campaigning before election day on November 2.
A focus by past City of Laval administrations on projects like those, which also tended to be located in or near downtown Laval rather than in the more residential outlying areas, provided fodder over the years to city council opposition councillors, such as those from Action Laval.
In spite of claims by opposition critics, incumbent Laval mayor Stéphane Boyer maintains that his administration strikes a balance between major projects, such as development of the city’s downtown, and smaller ones in neighbourhoods scattered all over Île Jésus. (Photo: Martin C. Barry, Laval News)
Dismisses opposition claims
Rightly or wrongly, they accused Boyer’s predecessor, Mayor Marc Demers who also led the Mouvement lavallois, of ignoring the more common needs of Laval’s tax-paying residents (including upgrades to park infrastructure and new local arenas) in neighborhoods all over Île Jésus where the vast majority of Laval’s bedroom community population is situated.
With a little more than a month and a half left until the people of Laval decide who will lead the city for the next four years, Mayor Boyer, 37, said late last week in a wide-ranging pre-election interview with The Laval News that he disagreed fundamentally with the opposition’s claims,
He maintained that his party, the Mouvement lavallois, has succeeded in striking a proper balance between big and small projects in line with the needs of Laval’s residents.
“The opposition always wants to do wedge politics, while telling people that they are forgotten in their neighbourhoods,” said Boyer.
Focused on big and small, says Boyer
“The reality is that, yes, there are a few big projects, because we are Quebec’s third-largest city. But there are a lot of small projects in the neighbourhoods. It’s just that we don’t talk as much about it.”
As examples of smaller and more local projects in recent years, Boyer cited the renewal and opening of a long-neglected beach area alongside the Rivière des Mille Îles in Laval-Ouest, as well as the inauguration of a new library branch and culture centre in Saint-François.
In numbers, according to the mayor, no more than 18 per cent on average of the City of Laval’s budgeted annual expenses gets allotted for major projects, including the upcoming central library and cultural complex in the Montmorency sector, while the rest goes towards the city’s everyday needs as well as smaller projects in neighbourhoods.
Mayor Stéphane Boyer and city hall receptionist Léna Assag. (Photo: Martin C. Barry, Laval News)
So, what is Stéphane Boyer’s pledge to voters should they choose to re-elect him? “What I am proposing to the citizens for the next few years is to concentrate on the essentials,” he said.
Making Laval more resilient
Noting that a good deal of Laval’s essential infrastructure, including major roadways, dates from the 1960s and 1970s when the population grew by 100,000 over a relative few years, he said a re-elected Mouvement lavallois administration would concentrate on basics like road maintenance, while keeping a focus on issues directly impacting homeowners such as flooding, ice storms and wind damage linked to climate change.
“So, my main focus for the next few years would be maintenance of infrastructure, to make the city more resilient and to better protect our citizens,” he said, while claiming that 94 per cent of the pledges the Mouvement lavallois made prior to the 2021 election are now accomplished or are underway.
Few details on Carré Laval project
The mayor does, in fact, have one project he announced a year ago that could be considered major, although it is longer-term. Carré Laval envisions the development in the space of 20 years of a large tract of land near Autoroute 15 in eastern Chomedey (formerly serving as a snow dump) into a mixed residential/commercial/light industrial sector.
Ironically, the opposition at city hall has criticized Boyer for not saying enough about this dossier. Boyer has justified his administration’s reluctance to say more, insisting it would be inappropriate to discuss in detail a project that’s only now getting off the ground.
Earlier this year, Mayor Boyer garnered a fair bit of media attention after he revealed that he suffered from a type of arthritis affecting the spinal cord, limiting some of his activities, although he said that he still intended to run for re-election.
Back problem not limiting him
As he explained in last week’s interview, the discomfort he experiences makes it more difficult for him to stand for lengths of time at the frequent receptions politicians are expected to attend. “After half an hour I need to sit down,” he said.
Boyer, who first entered Laval city politics in 2013 during the post-Gilles Vaillancourt surge that brought the Mouvement lavallois into office, served at first as the city councillor for Laval’s Duvernay-Pont-Viau district and as a senior member of the executive-committee. At the time of his election as mayor four years ago when he was 33, he was the youngest mayor in the City of Laval’s history.
While acknowledging that he owns and lives in a house in Laval-des-Rapides, Boyer was reluctant to reveal more about his personal circumstances. “I don’t talk about my personal life,” he said, while adding, “I want my family to be able to have their own private life.” What is better known about Boyer is his love of outdoor activities, including hiking, kayaking, rock climbing and sailing.
Incumbent Laval mayor Stéphane Boyer and a view behind the interim City Hall of some of the high-rise development that has sprung up across the city in recent years. (Photo: Martin C. Barry, Laval News)
He has less time for leisure
While he is also known to have travelled in his younger years to some distant parts of the world like South Africa and New Zealand, his role as mayor over the past four years has constrained his ability to continue travelling as extensively, he admitted.
“I don’t do it as much as I would like to now that I am mayor because I work six or seven days a week now and don’t have that much free time,” said Boyer.
Famously, one of the pledges Mayor Boyer made when running for the mayoralty in 2021 was that he would roll his salary (which was the second-highest among Quebec towns and cities at the time) back by $30,000 if elected.
Today, minus that amount, he earns around $200,000 a year. Although he has no intention of renewing the pledge, the mayor pointed out that his current salary is less than the salaries paid to the city manager and the assistant city manager.
On track to low property taxes
One of the inescapable truths about municipal election years is that the annual budgets that precede voting day almost always go easy on property taxpayers. As such, the budget by the Boyer administration in December last year held the tax increase to 1.9 per cent. The increase the year before was 4.8 per cent.
Noting that Laval’s economic development projections for the current year as well as for 2026 indicate continuing growth in the number of housing units built here, Boyer said the city is on track to break all previous records before the end of this year, allowing the city to maintain a correspondingly low tax rate because of the additional revenue.
The city of Laval has turned a big-box parking lot into a three-week experiment in ‘smart’ retail it says could help bring life back to its main streets.
The pop-up, branded ‘Lab Achetons plus ici’ (“Buy More Here”), runs until Sept. 28 and puts automation front and centre: self-scanning on smartphones, Radio Frequency Identification (RFID) checkout that rings up a basket in one pass, and wired inventory systems. Officials describe it as a real-world trial before asking independent merchants to adopt anything more widely.
A Radio Frequency Identification (RFID) checkout inside the ‘Achetons plus ici’ lab on the RONA Pont-Viau lot on September 8 2025. (Matthew Daldalian, NewsFirst Multimedia)
“The ‘Achetons plus ici’ Lab demonstrates our desire to collaborate with local businesses to boost the local economic fabric and modernize our commercial arteries,” said Christine Poirier, the councillor for Duvernay–Pont-Viau.
For Laval Économique, which is steering the project, the aim is as much urban as technical. “The goal of the laboratory is to see how we can transform commercial arteries, how we can change a little the way customers see commercial streets and shopkeepers,” said Lidia Divry, director of the city’s economic development arm, in an interview. She called the set-up “more of an experimental approach,” an invitation for residents to handle the tools themselves and for shopkeepers to judge whether any of it could make them “more efficient, more competitive.”
The pilot lands on a stretch of boulevard des Laurentides by design, said Professor Fabien Durif, who leads Université du Québec à Montréal’s (UQAM) Observatoire de la Consommation Responsable and helped design the project. “We’re really in a format that is a connected, autonomous, temporary micro-business,” he said. The immediate target isn’t ringing tills so much as people on the sidewalk. “The objective is to see if we can increase foot traffic so there really is this idea of revitalization.”
The ‘Achetons plus ici’ lab outside on the RONA Pont-Viau lot on September 8 2025. (Matthew Daldalian, NewsFirst Multimedia)
Inside the compact, seasonal micro-store, the merchandise is deliberately ordinary— batteries, rugs, tools, fertilizers, cleaners, paint and stain— so the friction (or ease) of the tech is the point. Shoppers can scan and pay on their phones, or pass tagged goods near a reader that tallies everything at once. Labels from Les Produits du Québec mark certified local products.
What counts as success? Not sales, at least not at first, Durif said. “Success isn’t necessarily sales. Success is the number of people who will come in, who will want to test the technologies, who will want to take part in the studies.” His team will track where visitors come from and how they traveled.
Divry described the effort as a proof of concept: “We’re in innovation. So this first project, it’s really to test innovation, to test the proof of concept.” Part of that means understanding hesitations and limits. Some residents will arrive ready to tap-to-pay; others will need reassurance or help. One hard constraint is built in. “It’s clear that you need to have a cellphone in this case,” she said, adding, however, that many older adults became comfortable with online purchasing during the pandemic as retail itself moved toward automation.
(From left to right) Bernard Pitre, Fabien Durif, Lidia Divry, and Youri Cupidon outside the ‘Achetons plus ici’ lab on the RONA Pont-Viau lot on September 8 2025. (Matthew Daldalian, NewsFirst Multimedia)
The project is being run by Laval Économique with UQAM’s business school, where Professor Fabien Durif’s observatory and GreenUXlab are studying how people use the technology. RONA is providing the store site, and Les Produits du Québec is making sure local products are highlighted. Funding comes from a 2023–2026 regional innovation agreement supported by Quebec and the City of Laval.
After Sept. 28, officials say they will weigh the findings and decide whether the automation tested in Pont-Viau belongs on Laval’s shopping streets. Residents can try the systems during the run and leave feedback. The numbers and how people feel will determine what survives beyond a RONA lot.
In a sunny suite in Chomedey, the English-Speaking Senior Wellness Centre hums most days with activities and coffee chats. “We took it to a whole other level,” said Kevin McLeod, director of the Youth and Parents AGAPE Association. “We have a center that’s open five days a week with about four activities per day and then some.”
AGAPE has served Laval’s English-speaking minority since 1976, growing from food relief and literacy help into a wide network that now includes seniors’ programming, anti-dropout initiatives and youth mental-health outreach.
The centre grew out of Agape’s work with the Community Health and Social Services Network (CHSSN) and other partners and has become a lifeline. “We’re providing a home for these people,” McLeod said. “They call us a family now.”
Director of AGAPE, Kevin Mcloed sits at his desk at the senior wellness centre on August 28 2025 (Matthew Daldalian, NewsFirst Media)
AGAPE’s leadership says the group has spent years mapping out the realities of Laval’s English-speaking community and shaping its programs accordingly. Its head office was deliberately planted in Chomedey, home to a large cluster of anglophones, but the mission was never meant to stop at one neighbourhood. From the start, the organization has framed its work as something broader: a commitment to community itself.
Help from officials
AGAPE’s expansion has also meant building partnerships. The association credits a long list of municipal supporters who pitch in on events and point staff toward opportunities— councillors Aglaia Revelakis, Aline Dib, Vasilios Karadogiannis, Ray Khalil, Sandra El-Helou, David De Cotis and Seta Topouzian among them, as well as Mayor Stéphane Boyer.
According to AGAPE, these officials have helped anchor fundraisers like a comedy night gala and senior-centre picnics; Revelakis, for instance, has regularly backed the seniors’ wellness club activities and helped steer the group toward City of Laval programs that supported events such as last year’s gala.
The municipal connection now runs through the classroom too. AGAPE says it is working with city staff on an application for a 16-month project at Laval Junior and Laval Senior Academy— part of a broader push to meet youth where they are. McLeod said the aim is to keep students engaged during a period of change in schools. “All signs point to go,” he said.
That youth focus has sharpened in recent years. In local elementary and high schools, AGAPE staff share mental-health resources and run anti-dropout efforts. “If you don’t want to talk to mom, dad or your caregiver or if you don’t want to talk to school, there are hotlines and numbers to help,” McLeod said. The team also trains adults to recognize and respond to students in distress.
Provincially, AGAPE cites steady help from Fabre MNA Alice Abou-Khalil, Chomedey MNA Sonia Lakhoyan-Olivier, as well as Laval des Rapides MNA Céline Haytayan, and Milles Iles MNA Virginie Dufour. Federally, the group points to the continued support of MP Annie Koutrakis, with Angelo Iacono and Fayçal El-Khoury also having taken part in community events.
Beyond elected officials, the association’s day-to-day work leans on a web of institutions like Centre Intégré De Santé et De Services Sociaux de Laval (CISSS) or Health Canada— along with private donors, fundraising and self-financing.
The challenges are real. In Quebec, debates over language can leave many older anglophones feeling sidelined, and McLeod acknowledged that sense of vulnerability. “Seniors are feeling uneasy, to say the least,” he said. Even so, he pointed to signs of progress: institutions are listening, new partnerships are forming, and AGAPE is pressing ahead. The organization’s aim, he emphasized, is to bridge divides.
For McLeod, success is measured less in budgets and more in moments— the quiet relief of a senior who chooses to return the next day, or the energy in a room when activities are underway. To him, that is proof the centre is working. “We’re trying to help everybody,” he said.
‘It’s creating a vicious circle,’ says Mille-Îles Liberal MNA Virginie Dufour
In a meeting last week between Laval region teachers’ union reps and three Quebec Liberal Party MNAs, including two from Laval, the union contended there’s been a noteworthy drop in the number of university students working towards becoming teachers because of the CAQ government’s failure to address worsening workplace conditions in public education.
From the left, Quebec Liberal MNA for Bourassa-Sauvé Madwa-Nika Cadet (the PLQ’s official critic for education and employment), Mille-Îles PLQ MNA Virginie Dufour, and Chomedey Liberal MNA Sona Lakhoyan Olivier met with officials from the Syndicat de l’enseignement de la région de Laval last week. (Photo: Martin C. Barry, Laval News)
Senior officials with the Syndicat de l’enseignement de la région de Laval met at union headquarters in Pont-Viau with Quebec Liberal MNA Madwa-Nika Cadet, the PLQ’s official critic for education and employment, as well as Chomedey PLQ MNA Sona Lakhoyan Olivier and Mille-Îles PLQ MNA Virginie Dufour.
No one wants to teach
“What they told us is that the enrollments for education in university have lowered immensely,” Lakhoyan Olivier said in an interview with The Laval News.
“They (students) don’t like to see what’s happening,” added Cadet, maintaining that the impact of the Legault government’s actions on the public education sector is discouraging university students from pursuing careers in teaching.
In June, shortly after the school year ended, the Fédération autonome de l’enseignement (with which the SERL is affiliated) issued a statement demanding that Quebec Education Minister Bernard Drainville be relieved of his cabinet duties by Premier François Legault in view of $570 million in cuts to the public education sector Drainville was making.
Untangling the priorities
“It is likely to get worse,” Cadet predicted, arguing that funding cuts have become the CAQ government’s number one priority, while the government’s second priority is the public education sector’s lack of qualified teachers.
“Since students are looking out for their future, they’re saying to themselves that they don’t want to go into education,” she continued. “They see the working conditions and they do not want to end up on that path.”
But adding to the problem, she said, the number of teachers already inside Quebec’s public education system is also declining simply because the teachers are leaving in desperation.
“They are leaving at the beginning of their careers in the first five years,” she said, noting that the phenomenon has been documented.
However, according to Cadet, experienced teachers are also abandoning the system in spite of the fact they often love working with and helping to educate children. “We don’t give the possibility for the teachers to succeed,” she said.
From the left, Mille-Îles PLQ MNA Virginie Dufour, Chomedey Liberal MNA Sona Lakhoyan Olivier and Quebec Liberal MNA for Bourassa-Sauvé Madwa-Nika Cadet were briefed last week by teachers’ union officials on the impact from the Legault government’s cuts to education budgets. (Photo: Martin C. Barry, Laval News)
‘A vicious circle,’ says Fournier
“It’s creating a vicious circle,” interjected Mille-Îles Liberal MNA Virginie Dufour. “Where you have less teachers, then less people interested.”
Taking into account the CAQ government’s management of the education portfolio in addition to all the other dossiers it oversees, Cadet said, “What everybody is telling us is that it’s the first time we see the situation as bad as this. The first time we see this much chaos. The first time we see so many last-minute decisions.
“And that’s the problem with this government,” she added. “First, they make a decision, and then they react. It’s like they don’t consult beforehand. And sometimes when they do, they consult in silos where they consult only one group, then another group, but the groups can’t talk to each other because they’re under non-disclosure agreements that stop them from talking.”
Youth employment impacted
With regards to another dossier, this time affecting the province-wide youth employment network run by the Carrefour jeunesse emploi (including the Laval branch), CJE officials told the PLQ MNAs that the CAQ government (which funds the network) has been demanding more accountability from the CJEs, while cutting budgets and resources.
“Money is now being spent more on bureaucracy and filling paperwork and forms than for giving service, Dufour said. “They’re funding less, but employees are putting in more time for red tape and paperwork,” added Lakhoyan Olivier.
Members of the City of Laval’s executive-committee have signed a letter of intention addressed to a real estate holding company, stating the city’s interest in purchasing a Sainte-Rose golf course for the purpose of redeveloping it into a public park.
The letter addressed to Groupe immobilier Van Houtte stated the city’s willingness to undertake negotiations with the company so that the golf course can be turned into a green space in line with Laval’s ongoing ambitions to preserve as much natural territory as possible.
An aerial view of Golf Sainte-Rose, which the city intends to purchase in order to develop a large public park.
CMM involvement
According to a release issued by the city, the undertaking is being done in conjunction with the Communauté métropolitaine de Montréal (CMM), which is a regional government authority with a mandate to eventually conserve 30 per cent of Montreal’s overall territory for an eventual network of regional parks.
The city says that in order to pay for the purchase of Golf Sainte-Rose, it will be making a formal application for a subsidy from the CMM through the regional authority’s Trame verte et bleue program.
And while the city foresees the deal closing before the end of next year, the city’s statement says the goal is for the golf course to remain open until the end of the 2027 golf season.
An unspoiled area
Surrounded by the Mille Îles river and a forested area known as the Mattawa Woods, Golf Sainte-Rose is seen by the City of Laval as an essential piece of the unspoiled green space the municipality wants to preserve permanently.
According to the city, conserving the golf course would help to restore nearby marshes and wet areas, to create a unique ecological corridor, to help deal with climate change impacts, and would also offer the population a large area suitable for games and sports in the open air.
“The Sainte-Rose golf course is a unique site in Laval, as much for its ecological value and for its recreational potential,” said Laval mayor Stéphane Boyer.
“What we have in mind is clear: to protect this territory while transforming it into a vast riverside nature park that is accessible to everyone. Few river banks in Laval offer such a large and promising area for leisure activities.
Consultations planned
“We therefore hope to develop outdoor activities that respect the natural environment and make it possible to take full advantage of nature,” Boyer added.
“Our wish is to build this vision in conjunction with the population and organizations in Laval. Together, we will turn this site into a model of balance between nature conservation, leisure and collective well-being.”
“Natural and green spaces are essential in order to deal with the climate crisis and to preserve the quality of life of the population,” said Massimo Iezzoni, executive director of the CMM. “We must act concretely and rapidly to enlarge and protect their territory. This is even more true in heavily urbanized areas like greater Montreal, where there is very little natural space left for us to reach the targets.”
Surpassing conservation goals
The city says it wants the transformation of Golf Sainte-Rose to take place with the participation of residents. Hence, citizens as well as organizations involved with the environment and leisure activities will be asked to contribute to deciding on the site’s future use.
In 2023, the City of Laval announced that it had surpassed its stated conservation goals by reaching 18 per cent protected territory, which was five times more than in 2009. Since 2021, the city has also acquired nearly 100 hectares of natural outdoor spaces thanks to $35 million in investments for that purpose.
Among those acquisitions were the purchase of Île Locas near Golf Sainte-Rose in the rivière des Mille Îles.
The current issue of the Laval News, volume 33-17, published on September 10th, 2025. Covering Laval local news, politics, and sports. (Click on the image to read the paper.)
Front page of The Laval News, September 10th, 2025 issue.
Event organizers contemplate resuming Querbes Ave. parade next year
Park Extension’s Place de la Gare was filled with joy and jubilation on the afternoon of Sunday Aug. 17 as people of Indian heritage from everywhere in the Montreal region gathered to take part in joyful festivities marking the day 79 years ago when India became a nation.
For many elected officials from Parc Ex as well as from throughout the Montreal region, the India Independence Day celebrations were just one of a lengthy series of events taking place all weekend as Montrealers were beginning to wind down after summer vacation.
One of Parc Ex’s big events
Organized annually by the India-Canada Organization, India Independence Day is one of the largest public events in Parc Extension every year. Months of preparation take place, leading up to it annually.
Although there has not been an India Independence Day parade along Querbes Ave. for a number of years, India-Canada Organization chairman Naseer Mehdi Khan, as well as an event organizer from the Borough of VSMPE both suggested to Nouvelles Parc Extension News that they haven’t given up hope of holding a parade next year if the conditions are right and there is willingness to go ahead with it.
Progress report on India
In addition to the celebrations, India Independence Day is also an occasion for the organizers to publicly speak about progress that’s been made during the previous year in the home country and to focus on issues of concern there.
Since the early 1990s, India has emerged as one of the fastest-growing economies in the developing world. This has been accompanied by increases in life expectancy, literacy rates and food security. India is now one of the world’s largest economies by nominal GDP, and third-largest by purchasing power parity.
Parc Extension city councillor Mary Deros spoke of her admiration and respect for the Indian Canadian community represented in the district during India Independence Day celebrations held in Place de la Gare on August 17. (Photo: Martin C. Barry, Nouvelles Parc Extension News)
Indian economy booming
During the local celebrations, an official representative from the Republic of India’s high commission in Canada spoke optimistically of India’s prospering economy, which ranks next to Germany, China and the United States (which is in first place).
He also spoke of significantly improved relations between India and Canada with the leadership of Prime Minister Mark Carney. Relations between Canada and India fell to an historic low during former Prime Minister Justin Trudeau’s time in office.
The corner of Saint Roch and Outremont was the place to party last month in Parc Ex
Hundreds of people in a mood to party gathered in the centre of Parc Extension on the weekend of August 15 to 17 to talk, eat, dance and soak up the Hellenic ambience at the annual Montreal Greek Festival.
Held around the same time as the Greek Orthodox Church’s Feast of the Dormition of the Mother of God, the last day, Sunday, was the culminating celebration of all things Greek.
Hellenic dancers from one of several Greek cultural organizations that performed during this year’s Montreal Greek Festival are seen here at the corner of Saint Roch and Outremont streets. (Photo: Martin C. Barry, Nouvelles Parc Extension News)
Four days of fun
It all took place at the intersection of Saint Roch and Outremont streets where hundreds of people of all ages – many of them Hellenic teens – formed circles and danced until late into the night. More than 20,000 attended the festival.
This was the first year newly-elected Hellenic Community of Greater Montreal president Basile Angelopoulos presided over the festivities.
“This is truly the beginning of a new era at the HCGM,” said Angelopoulos, a longtime Laval resident, who was elected in June. While he grew up in Laval, his parents lived in Parc Extension for a number of years after first arriving from Greece.
A continuing tradition
“Welcome to all our friends and thank you for being here to share this wonderful occasion, a tradition that continues and one that we will ensure will continue in the future,” he told the gathering prior to the beginning of a performance by Greek folk dancers.
Although she represents a Laval constituency, Vimy Liberal MP Annie Koutrakis spent an important part of her youth in Parc Extension. Before moving to Chomedey at age 17 with her parents, she attended Barclay School in Parc Ex and has fond memories of playing in the parks and on the streets of the area.
Volunteer BBQ chefs doing what many Greeks do best at the 2025 Montreal Greek Festival in Parc Extension. (Photo: Martin C. Barry, Nouvelles Parc Extension News)
A ‘homecoming’ for some
“The Montreal Greek Festival is like a homecoming for me every year,” she said in an interview with Nouvelles Parc Extension, reflecting a view held by many Greek Montrealers from all over the region who regard Parc Extension, with its many Greek Orthodox churches, as the spiritual centre of the Montreal Greek community.
A highlight of the evening on Sunday August 17 was the presentation by Chomedey Liberal MNA Sona Lakhoyan Olivier of a National Assembly Medal to longtime Parc Extension city councillor Mary Deros in recognition of Deros’s many years of public service. Although she now lives in Laval, Lakhoyan Olivier grew up in Parc Extension.
Among the dignitaries on hand during the Sunday August 17 presentations at the Montreal Greek Festival were (from the far left) Ensemble Montréal’s candidate for mayor in VSMPE Sylvain Gariépy, Parc Extension city councillor Mary Deros, Ensemble Montréal centre city mayoralty candidate Soraya Martinez Ferrada, Ahuntsic-Cartierville city councillor Effie Giannou and Saint-Laurent Borough Mayor Alan DeSousa. (Photo: Martin C. Barry, Nouvelles Parc Extension News)
Action Laval councillor for Saint-Bruno David De Cotis was joined by party colleagues at the Fête de Quartier. From the left, Val-des-Arbres councillor Achille Cifelli, Action Laval mayoralty candidate Frédéric Mayer, Saint-François councillor Isabelle Piché, David De Cotis and Action Laval candidate in Sainte-Dorothée James Bissi. (Photo: Martin C. Barry, Laval News)
All proceeds going to Service bénévole d’entraide Vimont-Auteuil (SBEVA)
Although some were worried about a sudden and unexpected downpour raining out the party, nearly all concerns were set aside when hundreds of residents of Laval’s Saint-Bruno district gathered near Lausanne Park Sunday afternoon August 24 for local city councillor David De Cotis’s ninth annual Fête de Quartier.
The area’s biggest community celebration of the year drew more than a dozen local organizations and merchants.
Right, oyster caterer Christopher Recine served up a plate of delectable crustaceans to Luca Asselin during the Fête de Quartier de Saint-Bruno last Sunday afternoon near Lausanne Park. (Photo: Martin C. Barry, Laval News)
They were eager to touch base with people from the area. Elected representatives from various levels of government were also on hand to introduce themselves.
All for a good cause
The event was organized by De Cotis in conjunction with the Service bénévole d’entraide Vimont-Auteuil (SBEVA), a local non-profit that provides meals-on-wheels to hundreds of individuals impacted by loss of personal autonomy.
All proceeds from the Fête de Quartier de Saint-Bruno will be going to SBEVA. “This a community event to create a sense of belonging for everyone – but especially the children,” De Cotis said in an interview with The Laval News.
“But at the same time, all the money raised today is going straight to the SBEVA. straight to the SBEVA.”
Two smiling representatives of the Dolce Sapore food store on René-Laennec Blvd. in Vimont were on hand to offer samples of their gourmet treats. (Photo: Martin C. Barry, Laval News)
