Today at Council, notice was made of a motion to come to our next Council meeting on November 9 to allow camping at several locations - including Tom Brown arena - from June 29 to July 4 in 2017. We're expecting a lot of visitors to Ottawa, and reasonably-priced hotel accomodations are already hard to find.
While I expect that campers will be generally well-behaved, I have already raised the need with staff for around-the-clock security and the same kind of alcohol rules that are in provincial parks. Of course, there would also be a fire ban and we need to think about field remediation if damage is done. If this proceeds, I want to ensure a minimum of disruption to nearby residents.
I'm pretty open-minded to this proposal, and can foresee that this would be a boon to our restaurants and shops, as well as providing some interesting opportunities to get to know our fellow Canadians from across the country. Let me know what you think by dropping me a line at jeff.leiper@ottawa.ca.
