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Office of Councillor Jeff Leiper
December 10, 2017
 
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Welcome to the Kitchissippi Ward newsletter!
 
 
 

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Scott Street / cycling changes post-LRT open house December 11

There will be an open house on December 11 at Tom Brown Arena (141 Bayview) from 6-8:30 to look at the proposed changes to Scott Street when the buses come off the detour. I've posted my broad strokes description and thoughts on the changes here, and the project website from the City is now available here, including online consultation.

Re-zoning sought to continue parking lot on Champagne

Starwood Mastercraft has filed an application with the City (full details not yet available) to allow it to continue to use its property at 115 Champagne (at Hickory) as a parking lot on a temporary basis for three years. The application follows on the heels of a failed bid by the developer for permission to operate the lot (on which they store cars for a local dealership) before the Committee of Adjustment in January 2017. At that time, the City argued forcefully against the proposed use before the Committee, as did residents and the Civic Hospital Neighbourhood Association. I will again be raising my objections to this application with the City, and encourage residents to do the same when the consultation period opens. Watch this space for further details.

Small-scale industrial uses in commercial zones study

The City is exploring amendments to the zoning by-law that would permit small-scale, low-impact industrial uses including micro-breweries, micro-distilleries, small-scale manufacturing and small-scale food processing associated with restaurants in commercial areas. There's more details here.

Ashcroft convent open house

Ashcroft is proposing to partially demolish the Les Soeurs de la Visitation Convent at 114 Richmond Road, and encapsulate some of it in glass. They would add office tenants and mixed commercial uses. There's an open house to view the plans on Wednesday, January 10 from 6-8 PM at the field house at Van Lang, 29 Van Lang Private. Staff from the City will be on hand, as well. Ashcroft was in to see me about this proposal some time ago, at which point I advised that there is likely to be significant community opposition to the plan, and that I would be guided by community feedback. The plans aren't yet available, and it's not clear to me what community uses are being proposed. At this point, there is no application to the City to make the changes. I strongly encourage residents to attend and provide their feedback at that session, and to stay tuned to this newsletter for how they can help influence the developer's course. See further details here.

174 Forward Avenue 8-storey permission sought

The owner of 174 Forward Avenue in Mechanicsville is seeking permissions including for an Official Plan Amendment, Zoning By-law Amendment, and site plan to build an 8-storey, 24-unit apartment building with six parking spaces. The secondary plan, just a few years old, calls for a limit on this site of four storeys. After lots of discussion and deliberate thought, the interior of Mechanicsville in that secondary plan was settled to be R4 zoning, and the developer is seeking an R5 with site-specific exceptions related to setbacks. While comments are nominally due on December 29, this was not circulated according to the standard practice we've established in our office, and we are working with the City to set up an open house and ensure that comments are considered for some reasonable period. More details on the application are here.

Pop-up office hours

We've got more pop-up hours planned before year-end! Come by to any of these to chat whatever's on your mind Kitchissippi or City-related - no appointment needed.

  • Thursday, December 14, Little Jo Berry's (1303 Wellington W.), 1-4 pm.
  • In the new year, we resume on Tuesday, January 9 at Cococo Chocolaterie (314 Richmond), 1-4 pm.
  • There is another confirmed pop-up at the Freshii at 324 Richmond Road on Saturday, January 27 from 11-2.

​I'm guessing we'll fill in the space between those January meetings with a couple of others, as well.

Stop controls and lower speed limit motion

I was pleased that Transportation Committee passed my motion this week to reduce the speed limit along the full stretch of Gladstone from Parkdale to Preston to 40 km/h. Right now, it's a hodge-podge of limits until you cross Preston at which point it becomes a uniform 40k. They also approved a change at Java/Clarendon and Ross/Spencer to four-way stops from two-way. Those items will be considered by Council this week.


SJAM Winter Trail crowdfunding

The SJAM Winter trail is again crowdfunding this year to fund its operations. Please head to the site here and help make the winter trail a reality again this year. They've raised, as of this morning, just over $11,000 so far, 55% of their $20,000 goal.

Blind Date at GCTC

I was intrigued by this review on apt613 of Blind Date, playing at the GCTC until December 17. It looks like a very fun experiment in improvisational theatre. Each night, an audience member is chosen to feature in the show with actor Tess Degenstein (who will be replaced by David Benjamin Tomlinson on the 16th for a queer, all-male-presenting night; an all-female-presenting show was last night). Check out the review and head to the GCTC box office here for tickets to the remaining shows.

Tree-lighting at Roy Duncan/Van Lang

For a second year, my office is working with the Westboro Beach Community Association, Van Lang tenants and Carlington Community Health Centre to organize a community tree lighting at Roy Duncan Park on Saturday, December 16 starting at 4:00. We'll have activities, hot chocolate and a bonfire this year, lighting up the tree once it's dark enough. On behalf of Team Kitchissippi, I do have one urgent request: we need to find someone licenced to operate a cherry-picker. It's a big tree, and we want to get as high up as we can with the lights! We've got the cherry-picker, but we need the operator. Please let us know if you can help.


At City Hall

Council and committees/budget

It's all budget, all the time right now as we head into the final Council meeting of the year on Wednesday. As most residents know, I've joined a number of councillors in calling for a 0.5% levy on the property tax bill to help us address our infrastructure gap.

We have a gap of around $70 million per year between what it would cost to maintain our assets in good condition and how much we're spending. In June, Council adopted a new long range financial plan that would see us add $6.8 million to capital per year to deal with the gap beginnning in 2018, in addition to one-time funding of $5 million in 2019 taken from strategic initiative funds.

Over 10 years, that will get us to the required $195 million per year (in 2017 dollars) estimated to be necessary to maintain our assets in a state of good repair. It's important to note, though, that this represents 3-4% growth per year in those contributions for most of that period (with that one-time funding in 2019, a ~6% CAGR), which will create increased budget pressure year after year.

Our proposed levy would help us make some strategic investments in our infrastructure, advance needed repairs, and avoid excessive future repair costs.

I'm particularly concerned about this in this ward given the deterioration in our roads caused by cuts to service new infills. In a memo sent to Council on Friday, the general managers of planning and public works noted in response to a question I again posed at Environment Committee during budget debate that "[s]ince 2013, the City has collected a nominal amount of Pavement Degradation Fees. The amount collected is not adequate to cover the City's maintenance costs. A business process review of these fees will begin in 2018." Road cut degradation fees don't even apply, according to the by-law, to most residential roads. This will be a key issue for me next year since it's not clear to me that our asset management plan is taking adequate account of the infill boom in our ward. As a result of my inquiries on this front for a few months now, the City is exploring bringing forward a new by-law and fees after the review.

At Council, we'll also consider a new Planning Advisory Committee that will consist of Council, resident, Federation of Citizen Association, builder, building owner, planning, architect and landscape architect communities. That committee is proposed to meet twice a year to comment on and then review the planning department's workplan. It would work like other advisory committees at the City, with public notice of its meetings, agendas, and following the advisory committees' rules of procedure.

Finally of note on the agenda, Council will be voting on establishing an R4 sponsors group to look at the rules for low-rise buildings that have more than four bedrooms. If passed, I'll be serving on that working group with Councillors Brockington, Fleury and Chernushenko.

The full agenda for City Council is here.

Before budget debate on Wednesday, we have our last Planning Committee meeting of the year. Residents in our ward may be very interested in the response by the City Solicitor to my colleague David Chernushenko's inquiry from last May on harmful substance abatement. The response confirms what I think we knew, which is that the City's involvement or leverage over things like asbestos removal is limited, being an area of provincial responsibility. I will endeavour to discuss this further with the Councillor. You can see the full Planning Committee agenda here.

It's a winter wonderland out there this morning! Have a great week, Kitchissippi. 

 
 
 

It's always a pleasure to drop by the Mission's property on Holland for their annual holiday reception. Shown here are some of the tenants, Mission staff (including Peter Tilley, kneeling), and staff from District Realty who manage the building. The building is a progressive response to homelessness in Ottawa as a mixed-market rental property. I'm proud that it's here in Kitchissippi.

 
 

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110 Laurier Avenue West
Ottawa, ON K1P 1J1
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Jeff Leiper, Councillor, Kitchissippi Ward

110 Laurier Avenue West
Ottawa, ON K1P 1J1
Canada
KitchissippiWard.ca / Facebook / Twitter

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