November 16, 2025 - Garnering over half of all votes cast in the November local elections in Montreal, Stephanie Valenzuela becomes the first Canadian Filipino borough mayor in Montreal. Receiving 16,452 out of over 32,000 ballots cast on November 2, Valenzuela edged out incumbent Gracia Kasok Katahwa as borough mayor of Côte-des-Neiges-Notre-Dame-de-Grâce (CDN-NDG) by over 6,000 votes.
Born and raised by Filipino immigrants in the Darlington district where CDN-NDG sits, Valenzuela was not only one of the youngest elected officials in Montreal when she won as councilor representing the Darlington district in 2021 at age 30 but also the first Canadian Filipino to earn a seat on the Montreal city council.
Now aged 34, Valenzuela went through the gruelling campaign period pregnant with her first child. On her social media account, she admitted hesitating to jump into the borough’s mayoral race.
“Balancing the campaign with my pregnancy was something I really had to think through. But the support of Dean and the thought of my little girl gave me the courage to take on this challenge.”
Valenzuela promised to “help build a borough that gives (my daughter and her generation) and the ones that come after more than what we ever had growing up in Côte-des-Neiges.”
A graduate of McGill University with a degree in political science and international development, Valenzuela ran under the party Ensemble Montreal, led by Soraya Martinez-Ferrada who won as Montreal city mayor.
Montreal has 19 boroughs which are made up of 58 electoral districts. Newly elected officials will be sworn in on November 19.
Addressing Montreal’s housing crisis is one of the party’s commitments. In an interview with The Condordian, Valenzuela acknowledged the complex issue of housing affordability. Citing the CDN-NDG borough, she said, “One of our biggest challenges for the next few years is how to avoid gentrifying those pockets of the borough…(that) they don’t become vacant buildings (with) big landlords (who) come in and start purchasing them to gentrify the area.” She is proposing regular inspections being done “to make sure that the landlord is compliant in fixing issues.”
In the same interview, Valenzuela stressed the importance of voting: “If you don’t vote, you’ve basically given your right to someone else to decide how your taxes will be spent, how your social programs will be handled, whether it’s at the provincial level for your healthcare, your education (or) at the municipal level for how your taxes are spent on your basic services.” She continued, “So I just think that, in general, we have to educate people and sensitize people on what it means to actually vote and what it can translate to when you take the time to do it.”
Growing up in Montreal, Valenzuela learned the value of giving back to the community through her parents who themselves turned to the Filipino community in Montreal and volunteered to build a network.
The CDN-NDG borough is home to the largest Filipino community in Quebec with also the largest concentration of Filipino youth under the age of 24. According to the 2021 census, over 33,000 Filipinos live in the Montreal metropolitan area.
About the Author
Rachel-Reid Ramon started writing for magazines and newspapers when she was still a junior at the University of the Philippines’ Communication degree program majoring in Journalism. She continued to write in a public relations/corporate communications capacity in various private and government offices until moving out of the country in 1997 to work as Programme Officer for the arts and culture branch of the Southeast Asian Ministers of Education Organization (SEAMEO-SPAFA) in Bangkok, Thailand. At the end of her term, Rachel found herself immigrating to Canada in the year 2000 and again searching for new beginnings.
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