City Council Unconcerned With Standards: BENN

Municipal standards are why we see what we see in this city.

We went downtown to watch the fireworks on the Ottawa River earlier this week. While wandering down Sparks Street after the event, I overheard a group who, by their accents, was likely from Britain. They were commenting on the recurring use of asphalt to patch the brick work. Suffice it to say they were not impressed.

One asked why didn’t the city just replace the broken red bricks with other red bricks? Simple observations by tourists who were attracted to the city, perhaps by something that the city-funded Tourism Ottawa promoted.

The same story could apply to the asphalt smears on concrete sidewalks. Or the road repairs that fail within months. The answer is both simple and complex. But it is captured by “municipal standard”.

The other day I was sitting on the patio at a local coffee shop, talking with a friend. Arrayed behind him were a dozen or so orange and black traffic pylons. Some on the street level. Some on the adjacent sidewalk.

Some laying on their sides in the grassy, weedy verge. They have been there for a few weeks. The street repairs long since completed. It’s a common occurrence.

Hazards impeding the flow of traffic. Getting in the way of cyclists. Forcing pedestrians and other sidewalk users (cyclists included) to leave the hard surface.

Why?

Is it because the contractor would prefer to leave the cones until they are needed elsewhere rather than sending a crew out to pick up the pylons and return them to the storage yard? Why haven’t staff required the contractor to clean up and clear out?

Even more to the point, why hasn’t city council, as part of its statutory role of overseeing city staff not insisted that staff get their act in gear? Municipal standard.

At the is-it-ever-going-to-be-completed Algonquin LRT station, construction barriers remain in place in three separate locations. Construction workers are seldom, if ever, in sight. No observable work underway. There is a second storey to second storey connection between the most southern Algonquin Station LRT building (that’s right, there are two buildings to serve one station) and Algonquin College’s Construction Arts building. The steel work was completed last summer. The glass enclosures were added this spring. The concrete under the second storey connector was poured several weeks ago. That’s a pace of work that is astoundingly slow and a perpetual inconvenience to the many users of this public space.

Why?

Why haven’t staff insisted that the contractor complete the work on a timely basis, then clean up and clear out? Why hasn’t city council insisted that staff get its act in gear? The same question applies to all of the LRT stations along the western extension. And the spaces in between. Municipal standard.

Municipal standard has three components.

The first is sloppy work from the contractor. Just look around and you will see it. Everywhere. Municipal standard.

The second is that city staff doesn’t care whether the contractor meets the minimum standard. Again, just look around and you will see it everywhere. Poor quality repairs. Long delays in leaving hazards along roadways, bike paths and sidewalks. Municipal standard.

Third, councillors don’t care. They don’t insist that staff show some respect for the tax dollars that they spend. They don’t insist that staff hold contractors to the minimum standards of the contract. By failing to perform their statutory obligation of oversight, councillors are showing the residents of Ottawa that they don’t care about the inconvenience that they inflict on us on a daily basis. They are showing us that they don’t think that stewardship of city resources matters. Municipal standard.

How could this be improved? How about setting municipal standards equal to those which staff and councillors would accept if the work was done at their own homes, using their own money?

Do you think, for even a nano-second that a member of staff or a councillor would allow the contractor to repair their concrete patio with asphalt? Of course not.

Do you think a member of staff or a councillor would allow the contractor to leave their tools, equipment and construction long after the work was completed? Of course not.

Why? Because their personal standards are higher than those they have created for the municipality. Neither staff nor councillor would allow a standard of work at their own homes as they regularly allow around the city.

That is why we see what we see. Because neither staff nor council are concerned enough to exercise the same care with municipal resources as they do with their own. And that pretty much sums up municipal standard.

Ron Benn, a finance executive, has been a member of the Centrepointe Community Association for the better part of three decades.

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