Valérie Plante announced last week that she will not seek re-election in 2025 after being the first female mayor of Montreal since 2017.

On Thursday, she spoke to CTV News Montreal anchor Caroline Van Vlaardingen about her shocking decision, what’s next for her and a recent controversial decision to remove a poster at city hall because it represented a woman wearing a hijab.

Watch the video above for the full interview.

The article below has been edited for clarity and length.

Television: There is a lot of talk today about the decision you made regarding the poster at city hall.. As you know, some people are very unhappy about this. Even if you say that there was unease, people say that it is a xenophobic gesture that these women, if they do not work in public places, are ordinary Montrealers like the rest of us. Why delete them?

PLANTE: I don’t want Montrealers to think that, you know, Montreal isn’t this incredible, inclusive city, where everyone is welcome, especially at city hall. So for me, if I can put things in perspective, this painting is part of a temporary exhibition which was anyway made to be modified along the way.

The City of Montreal has decided to remove a welcome sign at city hall with the image of a woman wearing a hijab because it has become controversial. The sign is posted on Monday, October 28, 2024. (Giuseppe Valiante / The Canadian Press)

For us, the goal is for everyone to feel welcome, and we feel like we’ve missed the goal. So for us, we’re going to modify it with the rest of the exhibition anyway, as was previously planned.

CTV: But will the next poster include women wearing hijabs or will you erase them?

PLANTE: It’s not me who signs each project, each element of city hall or the entire city. Again, for us it was important that people felt welcome. This sparked a lot of discussion. I have the impression that we haven’t understood the essentials, and for me, that’s not what we want.

CTV: But it also makes women wearing hijabs and the Muslim community feel unwelcome.

PLANTE: I think it’s also important to put things, I would say, in a broader perspective, because we’re talking about one board of directors. I don’t want to minimize it, but if you look at what we’ve created, our administration admitting, for example, that there is discrimination, that there is systemic racism.

The goal that we set for ourselves to create safe spaces within the City Hall staff, with big goals of having more diversity, all of those things and the way I’ve talked a lot about the Anti-Semitism and Islamophobic acts are not welcome in the City of Montreal. . That’s not who we are, so I hope people see things in a broader perspective. This is a panel in a temporary exhibition, in relation to all the actions that our administration has put in place to ensure that inclusiveness continues to be part of our values.

CTV: Let’s talk about your big personal decision that you announced last week. I think this surprised a lot of people, but you had obviously been thinking about this for a long time.

PLANTE: I have always put myself to the test, asking myself constant questions since the first day I took office. That being said, I would say this decision was made less than a month ago.

After thinking about it, I felt like I wasn’t able to guarantee the exact level of energy I’ve always given to Montrealers over the past eight years.

The mayor of Montreal, Valérie Plante, will not run again. (CTV News)

And now I know the energy it takes, right? It’s very demanding, high-intensity work that I love. It was a difficult decision to make, but I feel like we have done a lot of things, we have marked our territory, we have made decisions that will change the direction that Montreal is taking. I’m willing to give power back to others, which I think is also a good thing.

CTV: You say that this work requires a lot of energy and that the city is facing many challenges, with declining revenues, at the same time as you. increase in homelessness, housing problems, neighborhoods where people do not feel safe. They seem to be appearing more and more often. Are you leaving partly because you feel like you can’t meet these challenges with the energy you have left?

PLANT: Well, the answer is no because I’ve been dealing with this for almost eight years. I think I’ve always been the kind of mayor who doesn’t support the status quo, who looks around to find new solutions, to find new partnerships with the Quebec government, because many of the problems that you cite are not just the responsibility of the mayor, and citizens expect us to work together with our partners.

When I think about homelessness and mobility, when I think about the housing crisis, these are solutions that must be developed by the city in collaboration with the provincial and federal governments. And we accomplished some of the great things.

For example, for me, mobility, one of my greatest victories, certainly the blue line that we managed to achieve with the provincial government. But we need more, because Montrealers are hungry for the opportunity to leave their car at home, if possible, in order to get around more easily.

CTV: Speaking of different levels of government and cooperation, a lot of people who know you say you love politics, and you’ve been named the Happy Warrior during several of your campaigns. Are you considering another level of politics or perhaps working with the UN?

PLANT: At this point, I don’t know. I love so many things, you know, and I think for me, I decided to go into politics because I see it as a way to change the world. It’s a vehicle, but there are other ways, right? So right now, I’m still mayor for another year, and like you said, there are a lot of issues that I want to focus on, and the year after that, I guess we’ll see.

There are a lot of options but I think I will always care about Montreal. I will always care about social equity, housing, the environment, of course, because that’s probably the biggest legacy I leave here in Montreal, the way we transformed the city with more spaces greens, we are talking about sponge parks and stuff like that. So I will continue to change the world. But I don’t know how yet.

With files from Caroline Van Vlaardingen of CTV Montreal