Mayoral candidates debate the future of Ottawa

A mayoral debate was held by the Greater Ottawa Home Builders’ Association and Ottawa Real Estate Board on Sept. 24.

The debate’s main focus was housing in Ottawa. Jeff Leiper, Neil Saravanamuttoo and Alex Lawson along with the current mayor of Ottawa, Mark Sutcliffe, were participants.

Lawson thinks the city should focus on the not-for-profit sector. “I intend to use municipal lands the city is sitting on,” he said.

Leiper has a different approach.

“There are absolutely some things like urban boundary expansions, when I have been in favour of city processes,” said Leiper.

Saravanamutto says he wants to bring change to city hall and serve the people of Ottawa better and faster.

“We have had a city hall that has served insiders that has not worked for the people of Ottawa,” said Saravanamuttoo. “That’s what I am here to do. To make city hall work for everyone.”

Saravanamuttoo goal is to ensure that city hall keeps promises.

Leiper said Sutcliffe’s plans have not improved.

“Mark Sutcliffe’s plan is to cut the number of taxes that are available in order to have a very low tax rate,” said Leiper. “We are not going to be able to hire the people we need.”

The candidates also brought up A.I. as a tool to help the City of Ottawa.

“A.I. is great and it is a chance for us to pivot and actually serve the building industry much better,” said Saravanamuttoo. “For instance, we should be deploying A.I. for automated code and zoning compliance.”

Leiper is skeptical of population projections for the city.

“No one believes that this city will grow by half a million people in the next 20 years,” said Leiper. “That’s forcing us to make decisions that are not in the public’s interest.”

The candidates questioned the actions made by the current mayor during the debate, but Sutcliffe defended his record.

“I engaged with many of the people in this room and not-for-profit leaders and others to launch the housing innovation task force,” said Sutcliffe. “They came back with more than 50 recommendations which were adopted unanimously by city council to streamline approvals, shorten the time to approval, reduce and defer fees and just make it easier and cheaper for people to build homes in Ottawa.”

“What about the time between approval and registration?” said Lawson. “Have we done much?”

“We need to shorten all of the times that it takes,” replied Sutcliffe. “We’ve been working hard to do that.”