He was first elected to office in 1994 as a municipal councillor in the Town of Hampstead. When Hampstead and all the other cities on the Montreal island were forced to merge into the City of Montreal by the Parti Quebecois government in 2001, he was elected as a municipal councilor in the borough of Côte-Saint-Luc-Hampstead-Montreal West. Housefather then led the demerger movement in his borough. Following the successful demerger of all three municipalities as determined in a referendum on June 20, 2004, he was elected Mayor of the City of Côte-Saint-Luc, and served from 2005 until 2015, when he resigned following his election to Parliament.