Kristen Villebrun and Wendy Bush hoped they wouldn't have to pray for Chedoke Creek, but four years after they first raised alarm about the water's condition, they were part of an Indigenous full moon ceremony to do just that. About 50 people showed up near Princess Point on the dark and frigid Monday evening for the monthly ceremony, which was particularly special as it focused on Chedoke Creek. The body of water that runs into Cootes Paradise had about 24 billion litres of sewage and storm water runoff leak into it due to a gate being left open.
Councillors want the City of Ottawa to renegotiate its contract with a company offering insurance-like plans for damaged service lines as they demand an end to city-branded mail-outs that have infuriated residents. If that isn't possible, they want the city to break its agreement with Service Line Warranties of Canada (SLWC) altogether.
When Ottawa was hit by more than 75 millimetres of rain last week it filled a $232 million sewage tunnel, sending nearly 316 million litres of raw sewage into the Ottawa River. Unfortunately, it's not unexpected or unusual. "It was always known that if there were very large storms the city would be faced with a choice of either flooding sewage into people's basements or into the river," explained Dianne Saxe, a former environmental commissioner and the last person to hold that provincial post.
The City of Ottawa has issued a warning about scam callers impersonating its water meter replacement program representatives to request setting up appointments. The city’s small water meter replacement program does not call residents to book appointments, the advisory said. The small water meter replacement program is a partnership involving the City of Ottawa and Neptune Technology Group. When Neptune is in a specified community, residents will receive information at home prompting them to book appointments when spots are available.
Changes to the City of Ottawa’s Property Tax and Water Utility Deferral Program will now allow more low-and-fixed income seniors and disability recipients to qualify. This year’s qualifying income threshold is $48,441, which uses the Consumer Price Index to factor in the current cost of living. The changes to the program include: Expanding eligibility of low-income seniors from only 65 and over to include those between 60 to 64 who receive an allowance under the Old Age Security Act, and people 55 and older who are on pension or collect from a pension annuity. The requirement for applicants to have their accounts current has been removed
David Price hates when it rains. "It's just anxiety and stress," said the Orléans man, who for the past eight years has seen his Harvest Crescent backyard fill up with water whenever there's a downpour. The issue has to do with a city-owned culvert behind Price's home that he says is spilling water into his yard. When he bought the house in 2014, it wasn't a huge problem — but Price said it's been getting worse each year since then.
This summer, letters from Service Line Warranties of Canada (SLWC) will be mailed to residents’ homes giving them the chance to buy into a warranty program that would help with the costs of repairs to underground water and sewer service lines, if the need arises. City of Ottawa staff say the relaunch of an insurance-like pipe protection program will incorporate lessons learned from 2021, when many residents were left confused and angry about the offer of voluntary coverage from a private company with the city’s endorsement.
This summer, letters from Service Line Warranties of Canada (SLWC) will be mailed to residents’ homes giving them the chance to buy into a warranty program that would help with the costs of repairs to underground water and sewer service lines, if the need arises. Homeowners are responsible for a portion of the pipes under their private properties that connect their homes to city-owned water and sewer lines — something many residents aren’t aware of, according to city staff. Drawing attention to this potential drain on homeowners’ wallets is a key argument at the city for its team-up with SLWC.
To give residents easy access to drinking water this summer, the City of Ottawa has installed a water fountain in the city's Chinatown neighbourhood that attaches to a fire hydrant much like a fire hose. Ottawa's water services department noticed during last summer's heat waves in western Canada people loved having drinking fountains and misting stations run off the cities' fire hydrants — so in the fall, they decided to recreate the idea here.
Residents are worried about a potential increase of E. coli because the City of Ottawa won't install wires to prevent birds at Britannia and Mooney's Bay beaches this season. The wires were installed three metres above sections of those beaches a number of years ago to help prevent the congregation of gulls, which are linked to driving up E. coli counts in nearby water. The city said the wires will not go up this summer as it searches for other ways to manage seagulls and other birds.
The City of Ottawa is endorsing a sewer line insurance program, run by a private corporation, that raised alarms and caused confusion among residents and councillors last year. In a memo to the mayor and council on Wednesday, a director with Ottawa's Infrastructure & Water Services Department said his staff found there's enough interest in the program run by Service Line Warranties of Canada (SLWC) that it would extend it for another five years.
The City of Ottawa has plans to stop selling water in plastic bottles on city property by the end of June. In a memo being presented this week at the community and protective services committee, city staff say they are working with Coca-Cola to replace their bottled water in city vending machines with other Coca-Cola products. Due to contact obligations, it would cost the city $574,000 to simply remove all Coca-Cola products from the machines outright. That's because contract includes a binding minimum value commitment (MVC) that remains in place until 115,000 cases of drinks have been sold.
Ottawa city staff have submitted their recommendations for the proposed nuclear waste facility at Chalk River to ensure the Ottawa River is protected from contamination. In a memo dated March 10, staff outline 10 recommendations to ensure the safety of river, the primary source of drinking water for residents of Ottawa. "We are supportive of the proposed [near-surface disposal facility] as a means of providing improved environmental protection and engineered storage for low-level radioactive waste," the memo said.
If the developer's proposal is approved, residents say they're worried the required deep drilling and excavation could leave their water undrinkable. It's a problem homeowners said they've watched emerge over decades of routine testing. "We seem to be in a kind of Groundhog Day scenario as each development comes up," said Al Crosby, who has lived in Fairhaven since 1978.
Ottawa swimmers have faced the summer buzzkill of E. coli bacteria before, but this time human sewage isn't the culprit. Blame it on the goose poop. The City of Ottawa thought it had solved the bacteria problem at its worst hit beaches when it built a sewage storage tunnel to prevent sewage from overflowing and contaminating the Ottawa River.
The City of Ottawa earned a successful appeal of a condo developer's $4.5-million lawsuit win, which involved the discovery of a water main at a condo development site. In the summer of 2019, Charlesfort Developments won a lawsuit against the city due to the water main — just a metre from the site's property line — that led to a costly redesign of its project on Richmond Road to avoid disturbing city infrastructure.
Ottawa city councillors have acknowledged the communication campaign around a partnership with a private company that offers homeowners optional sewer and water line insurance was a disaster, and have taken steps to prevent it from happening again. "There's absolutely no question that the communications rollout was beyond [un]acceptable," Coun. Laura Dudas said at Monday's environment committee meeting. "The lines were blurred between a private entity and the city of Ottawa, and it confused our residents and asked that it put into question their trust in our use of our logo."
A letter arriving in mailboxes with a city of Ottawa logo on it, offering warranty coverage for sewer or water lines is raising questions from some residents. Who is the letter from and do you need warranty coverage? Rick Spring lives in Ottawa's Alta Vista neighbourhood. He received two different letters offering a "Service Line Warranty Plan." One of the letters outline pricing, which caused some concerns. "At first I wondered if it was a scam," said Spring.
In Canada's largest city, raw sewage flows into Lake Ontario so often, Toronto tells people they should never swim off the city's beaches for least two days after it rains. Across the country in Mission, B.C., a three-decade-old pipe that carries sewage under the Fraser River to a treatment plant in Abbotsford is so loaded operators can't even slip a camera inside it to look for damage. If that pipe bursts, it will dump 11 million litres of putrid water from area homes and businesses into a critical salmon habitat every day it isn't fixed.
A group of water experts, students and former councillors is urging the City of Ottawa to ban bottled water in all its arenas and facilities. The Ottawa Water Study Action Group(OWSAG)gathered at City Hall on Monday to both celebrate the quality of local drinking water and ask the city to get out of the plastic water bottle business. "Ottawa tap water is terrific, it is much better than bottle water," said former city councillor Diane Holmes at the meeting.
