A month after longtime civil rights activist Dan Philip died last year, Montreal’s city council unanimously adopted a motion agreeing to designate a location in his honour.
But in the year and a half since, those who worked closely with the former Black Coalition of Quebec president say they’ve heard nothing more from the city.
With a new mayor now elected, civil rights advocates are urging the city’s new administration to commit to honouring Philip and other deceased Black community leaders for their contributions.
“Promises are gathering dust on the shelves while important figures in our history still await the recognition they deserve,” Max Stanley Bazin, Black Coalition of Quebec president, said during a news conference Monday.
The conference came after more than a dozen community groups, including prominent ones representing the city’s Black community, wrote to Mayor Soraya Martinez Ferrada to request a meeting and urge her to act.
Noel Alexander, longtime head of the Jamaica Association of Montreal, in February 2016 photo.
In addition to honouring Philip, they are requesting the city name a location after former Jamaica Association of Montreal president Noel Alexander, who died in 2021 after decades of advocating for improved police relations in the city.
They are also asking the city to review its plan to honour legendary jazz pianist Oscar Peterson with a new downtown square.
Announced in 2021, the project aims to name a new green space on McGill College Ave. in his honour. Although initially planned to be completed by 2025 because of other major work in the area, the space has yet to open.
Instead, the groups are now calling on the city to return to an idea that Martinez Ferrada’s Ensemble Montréal had previously supported: renaming the entire Place des Festivals after Peterson.
Oscar Peterson performs at Place des Arts during the Montreal International Jazz Festival on July 10, 2004.
“We can see no gesture more appropriate than naming this location that is the heart of the annual jazz festival for the musician whose entire life made jazz and Montreal synonymous,” the letter states.
While the idea gained traction at the time, then-mayor Valérie Plante said both her administration and Peterson’s family agreed they wanted to find a new location to name after him instead of renaming an existing one.
Speaking alongside the groups on Monday, former Montreal city councillor Marvin Rotrand said the letter is a way of getting the new administration to engage with the community’s requests and recognize their significance.
Although certain locations across Montreal have already been named after other Black community leaders, Rotrand said acting on the requests would “correct a feeling of disappointment and abandonment.”
“The Black community just wants to be assured that if someone who has contributed passes away, they will be considered as well,” Rotrand added. “When they see the city passing motions and years go by with nothing happening, they begin to feel it’s not genuine.”
Martinez Ferrada’s office did not immediately respond to a request for comment Monday.
The news conference brought together several of the groups that signed the letter, with each speaking to how the three men contributed to shaping Montreal into the city it is today.
David Foster, the president of the St. Lucia Foundation of Canada, stressed that Philip devoted 40 years of his life to fighting against inequality and injustice.
Foster appealed directly to Martinez Ferrada, saying that honouring Philip along with the others is the least the city can do.
“If we forget these names … we forget much of Montreal’s history,” Foster said. “We can’t afford to risk that.”
jfeith@postmedia.com
