LRT Sub-Committee disbands; the City of Ottawa must create a transparency culture

Introduction

The LRT Sub-Committee formed in February 2023, following the release of the province's Ottawa Light Rail Transit Inquiry, which among other things, found that City Council's oversight of Phase One was inadequate, partly blocked by the Mayor for political reasons. 

According to the City, the Sub-Committee's mandate is 

[To] provide oversight and focused attention on non-operational matters related to Ottawa’s light rail systems (LRT), including all light rail construction projects, as well as the City’s action plan in response to the Ottawa Light Rail Public Inquiry and other third-party reviews of the light-rail transit system.

Basically, the Sub-Committee is in charge of oversight of capital projects for the LRT project, which currently includes 2.5 projects (Stage 2 East, West, and the nearly-completed South). The group (I'm not typing out "sub-committee" over and over) met eleven times since its founding a little less than two years ago, and have reported on progress on the inquiry recommendations, as well as providing updates on construction. 

The Sub-Committee is made of councillors Steve Desroches, Cathy Curry, Glen Gower, Theresa Kavanagh, Jeff Leiper, and Tim Tierney, with Mark Sutcliffe as mayor. 

The City cited a high workload on councillors, as well as their progress in following the inquiry recommendations; the Line 2/4 opening exercise has been proclaimed a success, it seems, at the City of Ottawa. 

Transparency is a culture, not a checklist item 

The City of Ottawa has a transparency problem. In my New Year's article, I listed transparency and accountability as a major problem at the City of Ottawa. This has continued with the LRT reports: we are receiving information on delays, which is an improvement over the haphazard Phase 1 process. However, the causes of delays should be public - we are paying for these billion dollar projects! - with a clear plan to address these delays and fix them to the best of the City and contractors' abilities. 

You may remember that while delays were generally reported on, OC Transpo continued to hint at opening dates, then missing them with no explanation. The trial running was accompanied by a an anticipated opening date of mid-November, which we decidedly did not meet. It is unclear what caused this delay specifically, or the over-two-years delay from the original opening date of 2022. Delays are acceptable; building and integrating a rail system is difficult, and events (such as the pandemic) are challenging to predict. The lack of public disclosure is not acceptable. 

Transit Commission, which is to be renamed the Transit Committee, will take over the work of the LRT group. Additionally, annual meetings will be reduced from eight to six, as part of an overall plan to reduce workload. 

This move will increase shift workload to Transit Commission, including four of the six LRT group members. The more conspiratorial may wonder if this isn't just a way for the City of Ottawa to reduce transparency. Combined with the reduction in the number of Transit Commission meetings, it certainly seems like fewer public updates and more secrecy. 

A delay with no transparency as to its causes and solutions, is not - and this announcement comes on the heels of an incoming $100 million lawsuit against AtkinsRéalis, formerly SNC Lavalin, over allegations of improper project management. Soon, we may know the real reasons behind the delays anyways. 

Transparency culture is not yet established at the City of Ottawa. While the disbanding of the group was probably inevitable, the City needs to ensure that both Transit Commission and the public are properly informed on the remaining legs of Stage 2, a requirement which has only been partly met so far. We need to be able, and willing, to learn from past project mistakes to build successful future projects; this is, after a fashion, a mirror of problems at OC Transpo's operations. 

This is not the kind of culture that can be created overnight. But it is a culture that is critical to the future success of our transit system, both operations and capital. 

Transparency needed at the City of Ottawa

The City of Ottawa must create a culture of transparency. What we need is a culture of disclosure; the City of Ottawa and OC Transpo must stop lying to the public, and lying to themselves. 

First, we need to increase, not decrease, the number of meetings of Transit Commission. It may create workload for councilors, but each meeting should be shorter, and require less preparation. Additionally, as part of this plan, the KPIs would be posted to the public for information, and may not necessarily be presented to the Transit Commission, reducing the time each meeting takes. 

There also needs to be continued regular disclosure of LRT progress, presented quarterly at Transit Commission and posted to an Open Data portal on OC Transpo's website, instead of hiding it in the meetings and agendas portal. Other data - reliability overall and by route, ridership, revenue, etc. should all be posted to the data portal in this manner as well. 

Only with regular, public updates, with processes for disclosure of information, will we be able to achieve true transparency.