With huge rural land base, City of Ottawa promises more respect and improved ditches for rural residents
James Pascual
Farmers Forum
OTTAWA — The city of Ottawa held its first rural summit in 17 years which included a promise to improve country ditches.
On November 2, over 250 people gathered for Ottawa’s Rural Summit 2024 at Sir Robert Borden High School. The event provided a platform for rural voices to engage directly with city leaders including five rural councillors. Mayor Mark Sutcliffe opened the event with his “10 Commitments to Rural Ottawa:”
1. Conduct a water rate review and improve rural ditches — this includes managing noxious weeds and standing water, as well as creating clear protocols for managing ditches.
2. Strengthen the mandate of the Agriculture and Rural Affairs Committee — the hope is to clarify and strengthen the committee’s mandate to avoid urban solutions on rural areas.
3. Ensure a dedicated rural lead in every City department — the plan is that every department has a go-to rural-focused employee who can better handle inquiries from rural residents.
4. Enhance rural paramedic response times — The city plans to hire 23 paramedics in 2025 and another 23 in 2026 to improve off-load times at hospitals. The city now has more than 450 paramedics. In 2022, paramedics responded to life-threatening calls within the 8-minute target only 62 per cent of the time. It takes longer when the patient is in a rural area.
5. Develop a rural-focused list for prioritizing intersection signals: But getting more intersection signals might not be easy as all 24 city councillors have requested new intersections or signals.
6. Incorporate rural feedback into road renewal projects: the mayor committed to consulting with rural councillors on new projects. After work started on a roundabout at Richmond, south of urban Ottawa, Rideau-Jock councillor David Brown noted that “I surprised city staff and the consultants on site with a farmer who was gracious enough to bring his tractor and drove right over the roundabout to show them it wasn’t going to be wide enough.”
7. Streamline planning processes for rural applicants: the hope is that go-to rural-focused staff will better understand an application request. As an example of the challenges, when North Gower Grains got into elevator business the first request for a grain bin installation was held up because no one in the city department knew what that was.
8. Create a balanced rural growth strategy: the city says it wants to preserve the character of rural villages and avoid densification.
9. Seek provincial recognition of Ottawa as a “rural city”: the goal is to gain eligibility for grants and provincial support in emergencies.
10. Commit to another Rural Summit within the next four years
With 1.4 million residents, Ottawa is the 6th largest city in Canada but 80 per cent of its land is rural and is home to almost 1,200 farms covering 300,000 acres. It’s also home to about 20 per cent of the city’s population or 280,000 people, mostly in villages and town.
That’s a lot of people and their concerns are numerous: lack of doctors, health care, employment, affordable housing and groceries, high taxes, crime and even traffic. The mayor’s 10 commitments, while appearing to be helpful, seem vague and minor, agreed two rural residents who spoke to Farmers Forum
According to Ottawa Citizen columnist Randall Denley, the summit was a first step to correcting a chronic problem of getting politicians and staff at Ottawa City Hall to understand the concerns of the city’s rural residents.
“The summit produced 10 so-called commitments, but when improving ditches is a top promise, you know the list is pretty meagre,” Denley wrote. “Still, there was some actual money behind it, increasing the city’s ditch budget from $1.8 million to $3.6 million annually. This generosity will still have to be approved by full council as part of the budget.”
The mayor told reporters that the 10 commitments are more than a first step toward concrete results.
“They are going to assure that, going forward, city hall is more attuned and responsive to the needs of rural residents,” he said.
Ottawa city council was to vote on the package of commitments on Dec. 11.
