Local residents getting short-changed in province’s ‘New Deal for Ottawa’s

The Ontario government and the City of Ottawa recently announced a new deal to provide operating and capital funding for Ottawa. While some money is better than no money, the devil is in the details and there is no denying these details are hellish.

A recent survey conducted in Orléans found that more than half (55%) of our neighbours believe the Provincial government doesn’t treat Ontario cities equally.

TGiven this new deal for Ottawa, it would seem Orléans residents have grounds for their point of view.

Last November, Ontario announced a massive new deal for Toronto. Over three years, the province will give Toronto $1.2 billion, which is about $396.61 for every resident of Toronto.

Meanwhile, the deal announced last week for Ottawa will see $197 million in operating investments over three years. That is about $181.81 per Ottawa resident.
Simply put, on a per capita basis Ottawa will only receive about 46 per cent of what Toronto will receive. Are we truly only worth 46 per cent of a Toronto resident?
And when we look at the details of the infrastructure investment the numbers get even worse.

In Toronto, they expect a capital investment of up to $7.6 billion over the next 10 years. Here in Ottawa, we’ll get $346 million over the same period. We can all see that this is also disproportionately weighted in favour of the Big Smoke.

The “New Deal” for Ottawa also purports to re-upload Hwy. 174 to the province.

For nearly 15 years, I’ve been calling on the Province to re-upload the 174. As a city coun-cillor, I had council endorse this idea and as MPP, I have introduced legislation to make this happen.

When the Premier finally came to Ottawa to announce the province was re-uploading the highway, I was thrilled. But then I read the news release and the details of the agreement. My enthusiasm was quickly extinguished.

The Government’s news release says that the province will help pay maintenance and rehabil-itation costs for the 174 while “a three-stage phased assessment of potential provincial ownership of the road is underway.”

Moreover, the agreement with the City says “Pending completion of 3.5 (b) Ottawa Road 174 Ownership 3-Stage Phased Plan, in the event that an asset transfer is considered…”

The language of the news release and the agree-ment is clear. The re-uploading of the highway is far from a done deal. Three years from now, after both provincial and municipal elections, this deal leaves lost of wiggle room for nothing to happen at all.

Ottawa politicians are trying to dine out on this new deal. But instead of a gourmet meal, residents in Ottawa are only getting Toronto’s table scraps.