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  #1  
Old Posted Jan 16, 2014, 6:31 PM
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City of Ottawa

City denies municipal workforce has ballooned since amalgamation

By David Reevely, OTTAWA CITIZEN January 15, 2014


OTTAWA — Ottawa’s city workforce hasn’t grown as much since amalgamation as a Western University professor contends, says the municipal government’s director of human resources.

Timothy Cobban, who researches local government, has compiled figures indicating that the numbers of city workers in municipalities that (like Ottawa) were forcibly merged by the provincial government starting in the late 1990s have increased sharply, even faster than they have in the cities and towns the province left alone.

His statistics, which he says are based on cities’ formal annual filings with the provincial government, show that the dozen municipal governments that now make up Ottawa had 9,767 full-time equivalent jobs (FTEs, as they’re called) a year before amalgamation, a number that climbed to 12,813 five years after the forced merger in 2001.

His statistics are wrong, the city’s Catherine Frederick said in an email Wednesday, two days after the Citizen asked the city what it thought of Cobban’s study. In 2000, the pre-amalgamation municipalities had 12,786 full-time equivalent jobs, she wrote.

Since then, it’s true that the number of city jobs has grown to 15,134 as of end of last December. That’s an increase of 18 per cent, Frederick wrote, during a period in which Ottawa’s population has also risen by 18 per cent.

“Of the FTE increases, 94 per cent are a result of additional provincial and federal legislated and mandated programs, and additional front line services to residents, for example, in the areas of ambulance and paramedic services and social housing,” Frederick wrote. “The cost associated with the increase in FTEs has been partially offset by reductions through amalgamation savings and corporate reorganizations and efficiencies.”

There’s no obvious explanation for the differing figures and Frederick didn’t offer one.

A financial return of the type Cobban says he used, available online from the province’s Ministry of Municipal Affairs, gives the number of full-time jobs in Ottawa’s pre-amalgamation governments as 9,767. But there were another 2,640 part-time and seasonal jobs, as well, which Cobban’s tally appears to leave out. (He didn’t immediately reply to a Citizen inquiry about this late Wednesday.)

There’s no certain way to calculate how many full-time jobs those part-time and seasonal positions add up to — and even if they were all actually full-time jobs, adding them all together still only yields 12,407, several hundred jobs shy of Frederick’s number.

dreevely@ottawacitizen.com

© Copyright (c) The Ottawa Citizen

http://www.ottawacitizen.com/busines...768/story.html
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Old Posted Jan 23, 2014, 12:33 AM
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Five themes in Ottawa Mayor Jim Watson's state of the city speech

By Jon Willing, Ottawa Sun
First posted: Wednesday, January 22, 2014 08:39 AM EST | Updated: Wednesday, January 22, 2014 06:06 PM EST


Beautification

Watson wants more pizzaz under the bridges of highways and has received the province's blessing to create street art.

He cited the Little Italy mural under the highway overpass on Preston St. as an example of how "dingy" underbellies of bridges can be brightened up.

And the mayor is challenging businesses to donate supplies to create the artwork under a program that will begin this summer.

The mayor still has garbage on his mind after rallying the city last year to keep the downtown clean.

After the city tested recycling bins on Elgin St., the mayor wants to expand the pilot to Laurier Ave. E. between Nicholas and Charlotte streets.

Design

Watson believes the city is getting its planning policies in order, so it's time to challenge architects to create a more eye-catching skyline.

"One just has to look at some of the blank walls - some 27 stories high - that dot our skyline to see the potential for doing better," Watson said in his speech. "For 2014, we will continue to provide leadership and seek excellence in architecture and built form."

It's a topic that has come up at planning committee with councillors urging architects to be functional and creative. No longer, it seems, are politicians settling for tall, narrow boxes.

Watson says the city is doing its part by designing an attractive Arts Court complex beside the Rideau Centre and an innovation centre at Bayview Yards.

The people's City Hall

More artwork, new galleries a refrigerated outdoor rink.

These are the additions to City Hall in recent years and Watson wants to continue promoting the municipal headquarters as the people's place, more than simply an administrative centre.

Watson says there were 179 festivals and activities at City Hall in 2013 compared to 77 the previous year.

In 2014 he'll bring back the Rural Expo, making it an annual event. In June the city will host the YMCA Biz Expo, showing off the talent of local entrepreneurs. And when Doors Open Ottawa happens in June, he wants staff from various city services at City Hall to tell people about their work.

Watson is also recommending the city create a Nelson Mandela Square outside City Hall's heritage building at Lisgar and Elgin streets to commemorate the late South African leader.

Infrastructure

Watson said new recreation centres will open in 2014, including the Richcraft Sensplex East and the Minto Recreation Complex in Barrhaven.

Work that continues at Lansdowne Park. TD Place will be ready for professional football and soccer this summer, Watson said.

There hasn't been much noise lately on the city's Ottawa River Action Plan, whose cornerstone project is a $175-million sewage tunnel that intercepts sewage overflows during heavy rainfall.

Watson said the upper-tier governments need to financially support the project in 2014 if the city wants the sewage tunnel built at the same time - and finish roughly at the same time - as the LRT tunnel.

"It's now up to them," Watson said. "This will be the year that they will decide whether or not to fund the final phase of the plan."

Watson said he has his first official meeting with new Gatineau Mayor Maxime Pedneaud-Jobin next Wednesday and he expects the Ottawa River to be a topic of discussion.

The LRT tunnel, by the way, is almost 10% complete.

Transportation

Watson said the city will begin the environmental assessment in 2014 for $3 billion in rapid transit extensions.

Like the sewage tunnel, there is still no concrete commitment from the upper-tier governments to help fund a project to bring rail service to Orléans, Bayshore Shopping Centre, Algonquin College and Riverside South.

While that study gets off the ground, the city will break ground on a $76-million Transitway extension between Bayshore and Moodie Drive.

Across the city, cyclists and pedestrians will welcome another groundbreaking when work begins on a bridge over the Rideau River connecting Somerset St. E. with Donald St.

It's not all rosy for motorists, however. Widening work on Hwy. 417 will continue.

"I'm sure everyone can understand and appreciate that this is short-term pain for long-term gain," Watson said.

Another piece of transportation research is in the works this year: A feasibility study on a downtown truck tunnel.

Twitter: @jonathanwilling

http://www.ottawasun.com/2014/01/22/...date-lookahead
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Old Posted Jan 23, 2014, 4:15 PM
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Bayshore-Moodie transitway is being built right away? A pleasant surprise. How long do people think it will take to build? 2 years to be ready by 2016?
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Old Posted Jan 23, 2014, 5:37 PM
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Yes, construction of the Bayshore to Moodie section of the Transitway was bumped forward right after the Feds announced that they were going to populate the ex-Nortel complex. One of the things which has kicked the price of that Transitway segment up is that the underpass of Moodie will be built now - so that the road will not need to be closed down once it becomes busy again. So the $76M will include a Transitway hugging the 417 from Bayshore Station to a new station just east of Moodie and an overpass for Holly Acres and an underpass at Moodie, as well as ramp changes (which includes two more new underpasses of the ramps for Moodie).
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Old Posted Jan 23, 2014, 6:14 PM
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Expect construction chaos and complaints to mark our Year of Progress

By Joanne Chianello, OTTAWA CITIZEN January 22, 2014


Mayor Jim Watson christened 2014 as the “Year of Progress” in the annual State of the City address, but don’t get too excited. Any “progress” seen in Ottawa this year will be incremental at best.

Take away Ottawa’s Big Three infrastructure projects — light rail, Lansdowne Park and the Ottawa River Action Plan, all files began in the previous term of council — and the progress report reads more like the to-do list for a smaller city than our G8 capital. Consider that the most exciting new move in Watson’s Wednesday morning speech is a scheme to paint murals on the walls of Hwy. 417 overpasses. Cool idea, but hardly earth-shattering.

And there’s the plan to expand on-street recycling. It was a successful pilot along Elgin Street, so why are we only expanding it to a small segment of Laurier Street East?

In fairness, the State of the City address is largely an opportunity for the mayor to rattle off a self-congratulatory list of accomplishments, so it’s no surprise there weren’t any major initiatives sprang at this year’s first council meeting. While we’re glad the city is moving forward with opening recreation centres and upgrading parks, these are the sorts of ventures we would expect from a relatively well-run city of this size.

Other supposed bright spots? The city just signed a contract with a CanAm baseball team, but the deal is a poor substitute for what we were promised (and will cost us more than $2 million in the first year). Even the Arts Court redevelopment, finally approved after years of delay, is diminished in scope from the original scenario and moving forward with money poached from the film studio project. (Watson didn’t mention whether the Airport Parkway pedestrian bridge would be completed this year).

So what will be new for 2014?

Try Construction Chaos and Complaints.

It is inevitable that building the Confederation Line — the first phase of the light rail system — will cause delays and traffic jams throughout the city. We’ll all need to exercise some patience until the LRT launches in 2018.

But you can understand why residents living on and near the Scott and Albert streets are already frustrated. In the past few months, they’ve learned that a city plan to run 2,500 buses a day along the thoroughfare during LRT construction is a done deal. People — including Somerset ward Coun. Diane Holmes — were stunned to learn this one-sentence direction was buried in a report that dealt with the passing of the $2.1-billion LRT contract.

At least 50 folks braved the frigid temperatures at the corner of Scott and Preston streets Wednesday morning to protest the move (and judging by the honking from passing vehicles, the have a fair amount of support). Residents realize they’ll have to put up with more traffic, says Dalhousie Community Association president Michael Powell who organized the protest. But they can’t understand why more buses can’t be rerouted on to the Sir John A. Macdonald Parkway.

According to the city’s own consultants, routing the express buses onto the parkway would delay them and other vehicles by another two minutes during the morning rush hour. Too much for those travellers? Would rerouting express buses onto the parkway actually alleviate congestion on Scott Street, or simply clog up two streets?

Who knows? At the very least, officials — led by the mayor — must do better reaching out to the public to address their concerns. So far, the city’s decision to dump most of the buses that usually run on the transitway onto Scott and Albert has been poorly explained.

Indeed, some of the news out of the light rail office doesn’t exactly inspire confidence. It hasn’t had a permanent director for almost a year. And as David Reevely recently reported, the RTG consortium building the LRT and the city had no plan to deal with the possibility of finding human remains when digging the tunnel, which actually happened.

Of course, the biggest event of 2014 (perhaps next to the opening of Lansdowne) will be the election. Watson plans to roll out the major planks of his platform in the fall. And that’s when we might get a sense of whether the mayor has a vision for Ottawa, or a plan for more incremental progress.

jchianello@ottawacitizen.com

twitter.com/jchianello
© Copyright (c) The Ottawa Citizen

http://www.ottawacitizen.com/news/Jo...674/story.html
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Old Posted Jan 23, 2014, 8:30 PM
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Originally Posted by rocketphish View Post
Five themes in Ottawa Mayor Jim Watson's state of the city speech

Watson believes the city is getting its planning policies in order, so it's time to challenge architects to create a more eye-catching skyline.

"One just has to look at some of the blank walls - some 27 stories high - that dot our skyline to see the potential for doing better," Watson said in his speech. "For 2014, we will continue to provide leadership and seek excellence in architecture and built form."

[B]It's a topic that has come up at planning committee with councillors urging architects to be functional and creative. No longer, it seems, are politicians settling for tall, narrow boxes.

http://www.ottawasun.com/2014/01/22/...date-lookahead
LOL. First of all, the city should ALWAYS be challenging architects to create more visually pleasing and architecturally eye-catching buildings, why just now?

Also, No longer settling for tall, narrow boxes. HA! Ottawa has practically no tall or narrow boxes. Our boxes are more like short and stumpy (See CBD).
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Old Posted Jan 23, 2014, 10:07 PM
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LOL. First of all, the city should ALWAYS be challenging architects to create more visually pleasing and architecturally eye-catching buildings, why just now?
I think it's a result of disappointment with the results (or lack thereof) we've seen in design in the last glut of highrise proposals/approvals.

After years of developers arguing that we can't have nice buildings because of height limits, there has now been a couple of years of significant relaxing on the question of height,* and yet it's debatable how much improvement we've seen in terms creativity and innovation in architecture and design. Would there be more if highrise=45-52 or more? maybe, (though I think it's a moot point, since highrises aren't selling right now!) but I do think that explains the "why now" from the City's perspective.

Paraphrasing: "you promised us you'd deliver creative designs if you were allowed to build taller; well we've been letting you build taller and the designs aren't getting much more creative, what's up? shape up!"


* granted, maybe not to the degree desired by some skyscraper aficionados, but moving from from highrise=12-15 to highrise=27-35 and up is a big change
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Old Posted May 14, 2014, 10:11 PM
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Ottawa council approves infill bylaw, plan for Scott-Albert LRT detour

By Matthew Pearson & Michael Woods, Ottawa Citizen May 14, 2014 3:12 PM


Scott-Albert corridor plan approved

Additional safety measures for the Scott-Albert corridor have been approved in a bid to make the route safer for pedestrians and cyclists.

More than 2,500 OC Transpo buses will be detoured every day onto Scott and Albert streets starting in 2016 while the Transitway is converted to light rail.

Council voted to instruct Rideau Transit Group, the consortium building the LRT, to include a multi-use pathway on the south side of Albert Street.

It also voted to remove the bus lanes on the detour immediately after the LRT starts running, which could alleviate worries that buses would continue to run along the corridor after the LRT opens in 2018.

Innovation Centre OK’d

The times they are a-changing for Bayview Yards.

Council has approved plans for a new, $30-million Innovation Centre, which will transform the rundown, 46,000-square-foot Municipal Works Building No. 4 into a modern meeting and event space, a digital media centre, and offices for both budding entrepreneurs and established companies.

The overhauled Mechanicsville facility will also feature new public spaces, including a café and a sprawling rooftop patio and the offices of Invest Ottawa, the city’s arms-length economic development agency.

The first phase is expected to be done in 2016, at which time city staff will present a business plan for phase two.

Infill bylaw ‘breaks new ground’

Council unanimously approved a new bylaw to govern infill development in mature neighbourhoods.

“We’re breaking new ground,” planning committee chair Peter Hume said.

The bylaw revolves around a central premise: look to what’s currently on a street for cues about what’s acceptable to build. The goal is to give both neighbours and developers certainty while maintaining and enhancing streetscape character and ensuring flexibility for landowners and developers.

The rules will apply to all homeowners, to new houses on new and existing lots, and to buildings up to four storeys tall.

More underpass murals coming this summer

Two local underpasses will be adorned with murals this summer, Mayor Jim Watson announced.

The murals at Metcalfe Street under Highway 417 and Riverside Drive under Bronson Avenue will be finished by the end of August.

“When you go under some of these underpasses, they’re often filled with graffiti or they’re dark and dingy,” Watson said. “This is a chance to lighten up those underpasses.”

At each location, one side will feature a mural celebrating the 150th anniversary of confederation, and the other will feature community-inspired mural by local artists.

A request for qualifications will be released this month.

Moving ahead with Millennium Park

Council gave the green light to a major expansion of Millennium Park, agreeing to front $6 million to finish the recreation facility in 2015.

The 11-hectare expansion will include four irrigated soccer fields, an artificial turf field, a splash pad, a field house and other elements.

Four developers — Claridge Homes, Mattamy Homes, Minto and Taggart — will design and build the project.

The city originally estimated it would cost $13 million to complete the project, but lowered the price tag to $8 million because the four developers were willing to design and build the park themselves.

Big ideas for 150th bash

As part of the city’s efforts to celebrate the 150th anniversary of Confederation, the mayor will host a 2017 Ideas Forum at city hall on June 8, from 1 to 3 p.m.

The goal of the event is to give residents, community groups, businesses and event planners an opportunity to discuss potential initiatives for 2017, a year for which Watson has set an ambitious goal of attracting 1.75 million more visitors to the city.

The city will also launch an online component, 150 Reasons to Visit Ottawa, to gather local tips, highlights and areas of interest. The information will be used to help with marketing and outreach efforts.


© Copyright (c) The Ottawa Citizen

http://www.ottawacitizen.com/busines...701/story.html
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Old Posted Sep 10, 2014, 5:34 PM
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Solar panel deal cuts city's revenue projections

By Jon Willing, Ottawa Sun
First posted: Wednesday, September 10, 2014 12:32 PM EDT | Updated: Wednesday, September 10, 2014 12:39 PM EDT


A new deal to install solar panels on municipal buildings means revenue projections won't be as bright for city.

Council on Wednesday approved a request from Energy Ottawa to pay 20 cents per square foot to lease rooftop space for the panels. It's half the cost of what the organization agreed to pay in 2011 when the initiative was announced.

However, Energy Ottawa is getting a lower-than-expected rate from Ontario Power Authority for the electricity provided to the provincial grid. That's why the organization wants a cheaper lease deal.

It's still revenue for the city, nonetheless.

The 2011 agreement allows Energy Ottawa to install solar panels on up to 20 of the municipality's largest rooftops. A pilot project started with City Hall and the OC Transpo building on Belfast Rd.

Energy Ottawa is selling the power generated by the panels under OPA's feed-in-tariff program.

Energy Ottawa is Hydro Ottawa's green energy company. The city is the sole shareholder of Hydro Ottawa.

The hope is that there's still a roughly 10-year payback for the installation price of the panels.

"I still think it's a good investment for Energy Ottawa to be making," company chief operating officer Greg Clarke told council.

Councillors Alan Hubley and Scott Moffatt voted against the new lease rate.

Hubley said he believes the feed-in-tariff program is more of a burden to taxpayers than a benefit. He also voted against the initiative when it first came to council in January 2011.

jon.willing@sunmedia.ca
Twitter: @JonathanWilling

http://www.ottawasun.com/2014/09/10/...ue-projections
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Old Posted Sep 10, 2014, 5:41 PM
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[B]Solar panel deal cuts city's revenue projections

Councillors Alan Hubley and Scott Moffatt voted against the new lease rate.

Hubley said he believes the feed-in-tariff program is more of a burden to taxpayers than a benefit. He also voted against the initiative when it first came to council in January 2011.

jon.willing@sunmedia.ca
Twitter: @JonathanWilling

http://www.ottawasun.com/2014/09/10/...ue-projections
As a city councillor, Hubely's interest should be in maximizing benefits for the City. He's letting ideology get in the way of that here.
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Old Posted Dec 2, 2014, 6:08 PM
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Councillor steps up to challenge mayor's power
As newbies sworn in, Coun. Eli El-Chantiry wants to keep Jim Watson in check

By Jon Willing, Ottawa Sun
First posted: Monday, December 01, 2014 01:39 PM EST | Updated: Monday, December 01, 2014 10:39 PM EST


A veteran councillor says he’ll try to prevent Mayor Jim Watson from seizing too much power in the new term of council.

A governance review, which will be up for a council vote Wednesday, recommends the mayor be given the sole authority to conduct performance reviews for the city manager and auditor general.

West Carleton-March Coun. Eli El-Chantiry said Monday that kind of responsibility “should not be centralized” and he plans to bring a motion to the council table to include the two deputy mayors in those reviews.

El-Chantiry, who served as a deputy last term of council, pointed out that the deputy mayors were included in the negotiations of city manager Kent Kirkpatrick’s contract earlier this year and in 2011.

The deputies should have the same role this term when it comes to performance reviews of the two critical positions in the bureaucracy, El-Chantiry said.

The recommendation for council also has the mayor getting authority over the salary, vacation time and sick leave requests from the city manager and auditor general.

Those decisions have been made by council’s finance and economic development committee and the audit subcommittee.

However, staff say in the governance review that it’s been “very difficult” to conduct performance reviews for the jobs under that system. As a result, there have been none.

Under the recommendations, council would still have the authority for hiring and firing those two positions. A council vote would also be required to adjust the salaries above approved guidelines.

Staff are recommending the mayor have the option to have the deputy mayors participate in the reviews, but El-Chantiry wants it set in stone.

And it looks like Watson is open to the idea.

After Monday evening’s swearing-in ceremony, Watson said he’s on board with El-Chantiry’s idea.

“I think that’s a great suggestion, and in fact, I was going to do that,” Watson said, adding he thought it would be part of the report but noted it’s an informal recommendation.

“It lessens the workload, quite frankly,” the mayor said.

The deputy positions have been more ceremonial than powerful under the Watson administration. If the mayor can’t make it to an event, his office calls up one of the deputies to fill in.

Still, the deputy mayors occasionally had a heightened role to play in governance. The city manager’s contract is one example and the two councillors were often privy to information discussed with committee chairpersons.

Twitter: @JonathanWilling

http://www.ottawasun.com/2014/12/01/...e-mayors-power
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Old Posted Jan 28, 2015, 6:43 PM
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Mayor outlines 5 themes for Ottawa in 2015

By Jon Willing, Ottawa Sun
First posted: Wednesday, January 28, 2015 09:20 AM EST | Updated: Wednesday, January 28, 2015 01:19 PM EST


Mayor Jim Watson said Ottawa is "on the cusp of something special" during his state of the city address Wednesday at City Hall.

"There has never been a more exciting time to be in the nation’s capital," Watson said as he charted the course for 2015.

Watson's speech can be broken down into five themes: Tributes, LRT, institutions, the economy and community. (For more details, scroll down to our live blog of the address)

TRIBUTES

Former Ottawa Senators captain Daniel Alfredsson will receive the key to the city, the highest civic honour, at a ceremony in March.

Alfredsson, who retired in December, has the team record for games played and points. Watson said Alfredsson was humbled when he called the former NHL star about the recognition. Watson said Alfredsson's charity work "set the gold standard" for other professional athletes.

"I think the team did a great job at his final skate at the Canadian Tire Centre, but this is a chance for the broader community to say thank you for a job well done," Watson said.

On a more sombre note, Watson announced the city will begin the process of creating a memorial for the six people killed in the bus-train crash in Barrhaven on Sept. 18, 2013. Watson said the city is looking at potential locations on city land. Barrhaven Coun. Jan Harder has been liaising with the families.

LRT

The city will unveil an Ottawa LRT vehicle Thursday at Lansdowne Park, something Watson called a "turning point" for transit in the city.

The vehicle will be on public display in the Aberdeen Pavilion until the end of March.

The city continues to study extensions of the backbone Confederation Line LRT, which will open in 2018.

The city continues to negotiate with the National Capital Commission over the western extension. Ottawa has lagged behind other major international cities when it comes to transit, Watson said.

"Ottawa deserves a world-class transportation system like this one, and I would argue that it is long overdue," he said.

INSTITUTIONS

Keen on building a new main library somewhere, Watson announced that the first public consultation will happen in March.

"I'm actually excited to listening to those ideas because I think you'll get a fairly large consensus they like a new library, but from there we want to drill down and find out what they exactly envision as the new library," Watson said.

Construction will also begin on the innovation centre at Bayview Yards and the new Arts Court complex near the Rideau Centre. And in West Carleton later this year, the Constance and Buckham's Bay community centre expansion will open.

ECONOMY

Watson is "optimistic" about the city's economic outlook but there's pressure to maintain and grow the job base.

He wants to attract more talented workers to Ottawa and allow startup companies to test emerging technologies inside the municipal government.

The city will host a tourism summit, largely with eyes on Canada's 150th birthday in 2017, but Watson wants to make sure the sector thrives in the years that follow. Expect to see more Ottawa 2017 ads and murals across the city.

For the rural sector, Watson committed to make the rural expo a permanent annual event. Usually held at City Hall, it's a day for city-slickers to be exposed to rural life.

Sports could play a huge role in the economy in 2015. The Can-Am Ottawa Champions baseball team takes the field and Lansdowne Park will host FIFA women's world cup games.

COMMUNITY

Watson said he has a closer working relationship with Gatineau Mayor Maxime Pedneau-Jobin and the two have been talking about transportation.

The city will finish building the country's second fully accessible baseball diamond at Notre-Dame des Champs Park in Orléans.

New pedestrian bridges will join communities, including one linking the Via Rail station to the Ottawa Stadium over Hwy. 417, and a crossing connecting Somerset St. with Donald St. over the Rideau River.

And, the city will continue planting more trees with a goal of planting 1 million by 2017.

http://www.ottawasun.com/2015/01/28/...ottawa-council
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Old Posted Jan 29, 2015, 2:51 PM
OTSkyline OTSkyline is offline
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Do we have any timeline as to when the Arts Court redevelopment is supposed to start? I'm pretty excited for this one and seeing as the condo is a very little part of the overall project, I could see them starting pretty quickly on it and not having to wait for % amount of sales.
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Old Posted Jan 29, 2015, 3:34 PM
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Do we have any timeline as to when the Arts Court redevelopment is supposed to start? I'm pretty excited for this one and seeing as the condo is a very little part of the overall project, I could see them starting pretty quickly on it and not having to wait for % amount of sales.
I agree, that area really needs some work done now! Really they should want to complete it for 2017... but Im sure we're just waiting for something.
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Old Posted Jan 29, 2015, 4:59 PM
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Don't know the timeline for the start of construction, but the podium (Arts Court) is set to be complete by Canada Day 2017 and the hotel/condo tower later that year, which seems like a lost opportunity considering the lack of hotel rooms downtown.
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Old Posted Jul 1, 2015, 8:29 PM
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City proposes sweeping changes to cash-for-parks policy

Matthew Pearson, Ottawa Citizen
Published on: July 1, 2015 | Last Updated: July 1, 2015 4:21 PM EDT


Councillors shouldn’t be allowed to put their names on plaques paid for with city money, says a report outlining sweeping changes to the city’s cash-for-parks policy.

The proposed changes come months after the Citizen reported that River Coun. Riley Brockington had no money in his ward’s special account for park upgrades because his predecessor, Maria McRae, emptied the account in her final year in office, spending more than $600,000 in 2014.

And while much of the money in the ward was spent on park improvements such as new play structures and games tables, a chunk of it went to more than two dozen commemorative benches — many of which feature bronze plaques emblazoned with McRae’s name. Each plaque cost $570, plus tax.

Approved in 2011, the policy was designed to ensure consistent and wise use of funds collected for park and recreation purposes.

But a review this spring has resulted in seven recommended amendments to make the policy better reflect the city’s transparency and accountability goals, allow for an expanded range of projects and ensure funds are used in a “fair and consistent manner,” according to a report set to be discussed by the planning committee next week.

Recommended amendments include:
  • Not allowing money to be spent on any items that could be perceived as promotional, including plaques or engravings containing councillors’ names, pictures or likenesses
  • Preventing negative account balances at any time
  • Publishing account balances quarterly and providing the planning committee with an annual spending summary
  • Allowing money to be spent on parks and recreation lifecycle replacement, repair and renewal, as well as allowing funds to advance renewal, repair and lifecycle replacement projects planned for future years
  • Converting three staff positions needed to deliver cash-in-lieu projects from continuous contract to full-time staff positions to encourage retention

The cash-in-lieu money comes from property developers: When they build something new, they have to hand over either land for parks for the new residents to whom they’re selling homes, or cash for the city to use on parks instead.

The city used to keep one big fund for these projects, rather than reserving money for the individual wards where the money was raised. But now, 60 per cent of fees go to the ward in which the development will occur and 40 per cent are is directed to a city-wide account.

There are tight rules around how the money can be spent. It is OK to buy land, play structures, splash pads and site furniture, as well as cover the cost of preparing a new park site and build and expand community centres, indoor pools and arenas.

Non-capital costs (including studies and ongoing maintenance), any costs related to lifecycle replacement of equipment and any work associated with facilities or property the city doesn’t own are not eligible.

The review found the program collected approximately $28.9 million between 2011 and 2014.

All wards received some funds, but, by design, account balances were not equal, the report says. Wards with the most development and the least opportunity for developers to hand over usable parkland saw a greater influx of cash-in-lieu dollars, which is why Kitchissippi and Somerset wards received the highest contributions, at $3.1 million and $2.9 million, respectively.

Conversely, rural and suburban wards received the least contribution because the volume in rural areas is lower than in urban areas and suburban developers tend to give the city land for parks instead of cash.

Osgoode ward, for example, received just $143,000 in payments under the policy, while Kanata North received $188,000 between 2011 and 2014.

The review proposes changes to how the public learns about city-wide and ward-specific account balances. Previously, this information was contained in a memo sent to the mayor and councillors.

The Citizen, for instance, was only able to report on McRae’s spending after obtaining a copy of a memo earlier this year that outlined the account balances as of Dec. 31, 2014.

But, if the changes are approved, the account balances will be published quarterly as an item on the planning agenda.

Changes are also proposed to prohibit accounts from going into the red, which the report says raises the possibility that a new councillor could take office with a ward account in a deficit position that needs to be corrected with funds collected during their term in office.

A number of councillors questioned the appropriateness of some items that cash-in-lieu funds had previously been spent on, and specifically asked that the policy be changed to prevent councillors from spending money on anything that contained councillors’ names or could be considered promotional, the report says.

The planning committee will discuss the changes at its July 7 meeting, but it won’t appear on council’s agenda until later this summer.

mpearson@ottawacitizen.com
twitter.com/mpearson78

http://ottawacitizen.com/news/local-...r-parks-policy
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  #17  
Old Posted Sep 23, 2015, 4:03 PM
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waterloowarrior waterloowarrior is offline
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Ottawa will have a new city manager as Kent Kirkpatrick will not be seeking a re-extension.
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  #18  
Old Posted Sep 23, 2015, 5:47 PM
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McC McC is offline
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cool, any way we can recruit these guys to replace him? I think they'd do a swell job

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  #19  
Old Posted Sep 24, 2015, 12:45 AM
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rocketphish rocketphish is offline
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Everybody's looking for a new Kent Kirkpatrick these days

David Reevely, Ottawa Citizen
Published on: September 23, 2015 | Last Updated: September 23, 2015 5:47 PM EDT


Ottawa’s city manager Kent Kirkpatrick is retiring at the end of his contract, citing his increasing difficulty doing his job as he also contends with multiple sclerosis.

He’ll serve until March, which is when his current contract expires. He’s had several contract extensions, for shorter and shorter terms. This time, he says no, he’s out.

The job requires a punishing schedule and a capacity for cool under nearly constant fire. Kirkpatrick’s done it as his condition, in the time I’ve been paying attention, has led him to start using a cane, a walker, a scooter and now a motorized wheelchair — the main outward sign of what’s probably a raft of less obvious challenges. Kirkpatrick is only Ottawa’s second city manager, after the messy importation of Bruce Thom from Edmonton at amalgamation.

He won’t be easy to replace. The City of Ottawa is now without both its deputy city managers, who’d be the obvious successors. The highly regarded Steve Kanellakos left to go be the city manager in Vaughan; Nancy Schepers has stepped down to a temporary post as an adviser on light rail before she departs.

Kanellakos has been pretty open about his ambition, including in this recent interview with a Vaughan paper:

Quote:
Kent Kirkpatrick, he’s the city manager (in Ottawa), he was a great supporter of mine and a mentor and he gave me an incredible opportunity, right up to my last job, but he was staying. … And so I made the decision that I want to lead an organization, I want to do it while I’m still feeling good and I have energy.
But he just left. Like, a few months ago. Stranger things have happened, but bailing on a new job so quickly isn’t Kanellakos’s style.

There are competent managers a level down — Susan Jones is acting in Kanellakos’s place at the head of the city’s “operations” division, and she’s extremely well respected in her regular job as general manager of emergency services. Social-services manager Aaron Burry and treasurer Marian Simulik would also have their champions, doing jobs that combine both high-level bureaucratic manoeuvring and on-the-ground execution. (Kirkpatrick was a finance guy.)

Transit boss John Manconi is respected as a get-things-done guy who’s stopped OC Transpo from being a constant source of embarrassments, though between that and his previous career in public-works I don’t know that he’s shown off the talent for managing tricky political files one would want. (I have heard some exotic theories about how he’s such a golden boy that everything from his predecessor’s firing to Kanellakos’s departure have been engineered for his benefit, but not from people who’d really know.) Ranging farther afield, you could make cases for city clerk and solicitor Rick O’Connor and even public-health supremo Isra Levy.

For any of these people, or others I haven’t thought of, city manager would be a two-rung promotion. Not unheard of, especially without deputy city managers in the mix, but not likely. And this is sidestepping the important question of whether any of them even wants the job.

No, they’re probably doing a national search on purpose. Which means Ottawa is looking for a new city manager at exactly the same time as Edmonton and Vancouver, two roughly similar cities (in Vancouver, it’s the City of Vancouver, not the metro region).

Edmonton’s city council fired its city manager Simon Farbrother two weeks ago, for reasons Mayor Don Iveson hasn’t really made clear. He’d been in the job five years. Vancouver’s Penny Ballem had her service “concluded” by Mayor Gregor Robertson after six years. She’s also a medical doctor and professor, British Columbia’s former deputy minister of health, and a native Montrealer.

You might think either of them would be worth a look in Ottawa. And perhaps they are. But, well, Farbrother’s last weeks in his job were plagued by a botched rollout of a new light-rail line, and one of the complaints about Ballem has been that she’s run a city government that doesn’t listen to what its citizens want.

Neither seems like a perfect fit for Ottawa at this point in its history.

On the up side, at least we won’t be competing with Toronto, which recently named a new city manager in Peter Wallace — the former secretary to the cabinet of Ontario, best known for testifying about his, er, concerns over what might have been going on in Dalton McGuinty’s office during McGuinty’s last days in power.

But there are three pretty good jobs for top municipal administrators open, all at the same time. It’s rare that candidates for such jobs have multiple potential employers competing for their services, and it’s not an aberration in Ottawa’s favour.

dreevely@ottawacitizen.com
twitter.com/davidreevely

http://ottawacitizen.com/news/local-...ick-these-days
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  #20  
Old Posted Sep 24, 2015, 1:39 AM
Norman Bates Norman Bates is offline
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Surely someone will emerge after the purge starts on parliament hill.
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