Ford, Crombie promise to take OC Transpo’s financial burden provincial

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The head of Ottawa’s transit committee says an Ontario election pledge to bankroll the financially-plagued OC Transpo for hundreds of millions of dollars represents one giant step for the city’s beleaguered LRT system.

“This is like the moon landing for city council,” Stittsville Coun. Glen Gower said Tuesday. “The enormity of the dollars involved … It’s really, really important.”

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Progressive Conservative Leader Doug Ford says Metrolinx, the crown corporation that manages road and transportation systems in Toronto and several other municipalities in Ontario, will be “uploading” OC Transpo’s financial headache.

OC Transpo is facing a $40-million shortfall per year and the city’s long-range financial plan for transit contained an $8-billion to $9-billion hole.

“The point here is we’re going to take the burden off Ottawa,” Ford said during a provincial election campaign stop at a window and door manufacturer in east Ottawa, where the on-again, off-again tariff threat from the United States also figured prominently.

“Their number one anchor around their neck is the cost of this LRT. We all saw what happened on Phase 1. We’re correcting that, all of us. Phase 2 is going to be much better, and Phase 3 will be great.”

The provincial Liberals made a similar promise Tuesday. Leader Bonnie Crombie also promised to upload the LRT to Metrolinx, to build Phase 3 out to Barrhaven and Kanata as planned and to build a dedicated bus lane to Rockland to connect riders in the east to the LRT.

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“The people of Ottawa deserve a government that shows up for them,” Crombie said in a statement. “My team has always had Ottawa’s back. We know you need more than you’re getting from Doug Ford, and Ontario’s Liberals are committed to working with Ottawa on a transportation system that does more for you.”

Mayor Mark Sutcliffe, who joined Ford at the east-end announcement, called the promise a “game changer.”

For months, Sutcliffe has campaigned for both the provincial and federal governments to give Ottawa its fair share of transportation funding help. Sutcliffe says the fine details of the arrangement are still being worked out and there will be hard negotiations ahead.

“We need to see what it’s going to mean and how we will be able to put this arrangement together,” he said.

“But, at a high level, this is hundreds of hundreds of millions of dollars, potentially billions of dollars, that the City of Ottawa is committed to spending over the next 20-30 years that will now be the responsibility of the provincial government.”

Sutcliffe said OC Transpo would still be in charge of the transit system in Ottawa, but the relationship with Metrolinx should work similar to the way the Toronto Transit Commission worked with Metrolinx.

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“What I said last August, when I talked about fairness for Ottawa, is that we don’t get the same deal as other cities, if you look at cities like Toronto, Mississauga, Brampton and Hamilton. The provincial government pays the capital costs on the lifecycle maintenance costs of their light-rail systems. They don’t pay that in Ottawa, so I think this is an opportunity to level the playing field.”

The promised provincial funding comes on the heels of a federal government pledge of $180 million to upgrade public transit and infrastructure in Ottawa over the next decade.

PC candidate Prabmeet Sarkaria, who served as transportation minister in Ford’s government, said he had talked regularly with Sutcliffe for months about the unique challenges Ottawa faced with OC Transpo.

“When you talk about lifecycle and capital costs, those are what we will continue to work with our team at Metrolinx to make sure this upload takes place,” he said.

“We will work very, very closely with (the City of Ottawa) to ensure that happens and to help deliver those better transit options for the city. I think it’s a big day for transit for the City of Ottawa. We want to be there hand in hand, supporting that and ensuring we can get that service delivered.”

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Pressed on whether his appearance alongside Ford represented him taking a stance in the provincial election, Sutcliffe said he was only interested in what was best for the city.

“What I care about is solutions for Ottawa,” Sutcliffe said. “I hope every party that’s running in this election makes a similar promise. (Ford) invited me to come today, so I came. If other party leaders want to make the same promise and want to invite me to sit down with them, I’m always available.”

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