Kelly: Thoughts on the 2024 budget

This past week, council passed the 2024 budget. We have heard for years about financial pressures and rising costs and the city is not immune from these issues.

When times are challenging, the city should work to ease the burden on their residents as much as possible, while still delivering the services that become so much more important when things are difficult. There are competing crises that the city needs to address, with housing, homelessness and affordability being top of mind. This budget commits $33.5 million in municipal funds to improve access to housing and provide support to keep people housed.

I campaigned on getting roads repaired, addressing a paramedic shortage in our ward, and helping residents enjoy this community the way I was able to as a child, and am happy to see an additional $3.8 million is being committed to strengthen our paramedic force, adding more staff positions and purchasing needed equipment.

In our ward, we are seeing increased investments in to recreation as well as the expansion of the Corkery Community Centre; a new park is being prepared for the Carp area; and new investments into recreation at the Kinburn Community Centre, along with Rivington and Langstaff parks in Carp.

A further $300 million was approved for integrated road construction and renewal, including sidewalks and pathways to better connect the city. In our ward alone, we have received a significant increase to our roads budget, something I pushed for continuously. 

We have seen work on the renewal of culverts, allowing further road resurfacing to take place, and are excited by the investment of several million dollars for roadwork in Ward 5 in the 2024 budget. We are going to see a resurfacing of much of Carp Road in the next few years because of this increased investment. In this project alone, we are seeing an increase on our entire budgeted roadwork from last year.

There is going to be resurfacing taking place on March Road as well to ensure the roads that lead to our beautiful ward offer the sort of welcome deserved by those who choose to live out here. I have heard from many residents about the increased cost associated with driving some of our less-than-ideal roadways. I am working on addressing those that can help the most people, while continuing to work on addressing those roads that have long been neglected. We are seeing resurfacing take place on roads that have major issues that have been ignored and we are excited to see this increase and to see the city working to improve the rural roadway. 

Thank you to the residents who attended our budget consultation and provided feedback through the consultation process. 

As always, it is a pleasure and honour to serve as your municipal representative and I look forward to seeing you all, out and about, celebrating the season over the next few weeks. 

To read all Coun. Clarke Kelly’s columns, click here.

The preceding column was written by City of Ottawa Ward 5 Coun. Clarke Kelly, part of the councillor’s ongoing, bi-weekly column for West Carleton Online, made available to the entire community through an agreement with the publisher.