By Taylor Blewett, Ottawa Citizen, February 19, 2019
Ottawa homeowners could pay — very, very slightly — less in stormwater fees in 2019 than originally planned, thanks to a motion passed at environment committee Tuesday that will rework the proposed stormwater fee increase in the city’s draft budget to keep it in the single digits.
When the draft budget was released early February, it called for a 10.8-per-cent increase to the stormwater fee.
Rideau-Goulbourn Coun. Scott Moffatt, chair of the standing committee on environmental protection, water and waste management, then told this newspaper he was working with city staff to see if it was possible to bring this proposed increase down without resorting to “smoke-and-mirrors” tactics of the like seen in the 2018 budget, when council borrowed money to deflate the projected stormwater fee increase from 13 per cent to five per cent, facing an election year. “It didn’t really fix it,” said Moffatt.
https://ottawacitizen.com/news/local-news/city-taxpayers-should-see-single-digit-stormwater-increase-environment-committee-decides