[3] When asked to name the highlight of his career in the Drapeau administration, Prégent cited his successful battle in 1980 to keep dépanneurs out of gas stations.
His re-election was ascribed largely to his personal popularity, and newspaper reports noted that he did not mention the Civic Party in his campaign materials.
[7] Jean Doré's Montreal Citizens' Movement (MCM) won a landslide majority in the 1986 election, winning fifty-five of fifty-eight seats.
Prégent was joined in opposition by independent councillor Nick Auf der Maur and by Sofoklis Rasoulis of the Montreal Municipal Democratic Alliance.
"[10] He cast the sole vote against various municipal expenditures a few months later, arguing that the city should instead prioritize a property tax cut.
[18] Prégent was replaced as opposition leader during this period by Nick Auf der Maur, whom Dupras had recruited to be the Civic Party's lead spokesperson in council.
[23] Prégent joined Pierre Bourque's newly formed Vision Montreal party in 1994[24] and ran under its banner in the 1994 municipal election.
Bourque was sworn in as mayor in November 1994 and named Prégent as a member of the Montreal executive committee with responsibility for youth, architecture, and engineering.
[25] In 1995, Prégent announced a call for tenders for the construction of new holding pools and sewer pipes in southwest Montreal, a project valued at $12.8 million.
)[26] Prégent also oversaw a $17 million project to construct a new four-lane bridge on Montreal's Wellington tunnel and, until 1996, was responsible for navigating a plan to restructure the city's fire department.
[29] Separate from his responsibilities on the executive committee, he opposed plans to construct a mega-store in competition with the Atwater market.
[30] Prégent resigned from Vision Montreal to serve as an independent councillor in July 1997, saying that Bourque's party lacked leadership.
[36] He approved of Bourque's decision to waive restrictions on condominium conversions in Saint-Henri,[37] though he strongly opposed plans to permit a private company to construct a garbage transfer depot in the neighbourhood.
[41] He retired at the 2001 municipal election, giving an endorsement to Gérald Tremblay's newly formed Montreal Island Citizens Union.
[42] The Montreal Gazette portrayed Prégent in a more favourable light toward the end of his career, with a March 1999 editorial describing him as having "a way of getting things done quietly and without a whole lot of democratic ceremony.