Shrink Ottawa city council, Watson says

Ottawa mayoral candidate Jim Watson took aim at what he sees as an oversized, unresponsive amalgamated city of Ottawa, announcing a plan to shrink the size of city council from 23 to as few as 14 councillors.

Tapping into dissatisfaction with local government since the 2001 amalgamation of Ottawa and its surrounding cities and townships, Watson said the reduction in council seats would be accompanied by the creation of borough councils to be more responsive to local issues.

"It's been ten years since amalgamation," said Watson. "I don't want to de-amalgamate, but I want to give local communities greater say over local decisions."

Watson is proposing reducing council to between 14 and 17 councillors, which he said would save the city up to $2 million in annual costs for salaries and office budgets. He said while Ottawa averages one councillor per 34,000 people, other large municipalities are able to represent more people effectively. Toronto has about one councillor for every 57,000 people, while Calgary has one councillor for every 65,000.

He said he would initiate steps to adopt the plan within 60 days of the election.

Watson, who served as mayor of pre-amalgamation Ottawa from 1997 to 2000, said the larger council has become too bogged down with small local issues that would be better handled locally.

But he said wants to begin work to create the borough councils to work through this issue immediately. These councils would include two to four councillors who would engage monthly with their community. The local councils would keep city council focused on issues that affect everyone in the region.

"Council should be dealing with big issues not with stop signs and traffic signs," he said.

Proposal would drown out local voices: Cullen

Bay Ward councillor and mayoral candidate Alex Cullen called the proposal disingenuous in a release on his campaign page on social networking website Facebook.

"Moving from 23 to 14 councillors will raise ward sizes to 61,000, drowning out local neighbourhoods and making it harder for ordinary people to get elected," said Cullen in a statement.

River Ward councillor Maria McRae also said she had concerns about the borough council plan, which she said could have the opposite impact than that intended, making council less responsive.

"It would be very easy for an elected official to say well I'm not accountable for this the borough committee is accountable, you can't hold me accountable," said McRae.

Watson, Cullen, Capital Ward councillor Clive Doucet are three of the more prominent candidates running for mayor against incumbent Larry O'Brien. Ottawa's municipal election will be held on Oct. 25.