Richard Ryan

Richard Ryan is a politician in Montreal, Quebec, Canada. He has served on the Plateau-Mont-Royal borough council since 2009 and on the Montreal city council since 2013 as a member of Projet Montréal. Private career Ryan was a prominent member of the Mile End Citizens' Committee before entering political life. He helped to organize a series of meetings in Montreal's Mile End neighbourhood in early 2009 to encourage greater citizen involvement in urban planning, after the Plateau-Mont-Royal borough council announced a nine-million dollar revitalization program for the area's former industrial zone. Political career Borough councillor Ryan was first elected to the Plateau-Mont-Royal borough council in the 2009 Montreal municipal election, defeating Union Montreal incumbent Eleni Fakotakis-Kolaitis for the Mile-End borough council seat. Projet Montréal won ten city council seats in this election to become the third-largest party at the municipal level; in Plateau-Mont-Royal, it won all seven available seats to become the governing party. In his first term, Ryan advocated for a pedestrian level crossing between the Mile-End and Rosemont neighbourhoods, supported a pilot project for urban beehives, and helped facilitate a deal to prevent a community of artists from being forced out of Mile End's former industrial area due to gentrification.