CARP – It’s a strategy expected to guide economic development in West Carleton for the next 10 years and community members were invited to provide their input on that strategy during a June 12 focus group meeting at the Carp Agricultural Hall last Wednesday (June 12).

The City of Ottawa is leading the process to develop an Ottawa Rural Economic Development Strategy along the same timeline as the rewriting of the city’s Official Plan, and city staff hosted a focus group meeting in Carp last Wednesday, June 12.

It was the first of four Ottawa Rural Economic Development Strategy focus group meetings held in the rural wards of the city. The city hired MDBInsight consultants to lead the process and senior consultant Earl Lamothe led the afternoon Carp focus group.

The Carp focus group was the first workshop scheduled for the rural wards of Ottawa over the next two days.

Lamothe told the roughly 23 in attendance (not including city staff) the focus group would use the SWAT strategy (Strengths, Weaknesses, Advantages and Threats) as the foundation of the focus group. Key strategies in the process also included identifying priorities, actions and outcomes.

Those in attendance included many of West Carleton’s community leaders such as 2018 council candidate Judi Varga-Toth, former West Carleton mayor and the ward’s first councillor farmer Dwight Eastman and Carp Road Corridor Business Improvement Area (CRCBIA) executive director Roddy Bolivar.

Bolivar spoke to West Carleton Online today (June 18) about the focus group and his thoughts on the strategy moving forward.

“We’ve already been participating,” Bolivar said.

Bolivar sad they were contacted directly by city staff about two months ago.

“We helped build the consultation process,” he said. “The city is exploring where to take this. They haven’t developed a firm direction yet.”

Bolivar feels the city’s process has been “well conducted from that point of view” but the cross-section of input has been “small.”

“The city is exploring where to take this, but they haven’t developed a firm direction yet,” he said.

Bolivar feels there has been two main groups involved.

“Right now, we see two communities getting involved,” he said. “The business community and the local community.”

Bolivar spoke from a business perspective.

“A business is a business,” Bolivar said referring to the designation of ‘rural business.’ “Rural businesses are agriculture businesses. KIN Winery I guess, because it has to be in a rural area.”

While Bolivar said the workshop was focused on the rural perspective, an economic strategy doesn’t need to separate between rural and urban.

“Make it easier to do business,” he said. “The concept of red tape. The fact this is the theme year over year shows there is too much, let’s call it red tape. We feel we are overburdened. We are businesses located in a rural area, not rural businesses.”

And that’s something Bolivar feels the city can control.

“It’s all in their control,” he said. “It’s 100 per cent in the city’s control. What we see is more and more businesses coming in to the area and it takes two years to get a building permit. You can talk to anyone looking to build anything. The uncertainty of the timing on approvals is the most frustrating thing and we see this often in the corridor.”

Bolivar says he sees business interests come in to the CRCBIA and then leave when the process is too time-consuming.

“They come and then go away,” he said. “The septic and well approvals. The capital isn’t necessarily the problem.”

Bolivar says the city could improve the economic development in the rural and urban areas by doing one simple thing.

“Make it easier to do business,” he said. “The concept of red tape. The fact this is a theme, year over year shows there is too much, let’s call it red tape.”

Bolivar thinks it is a fairly easy fix as well.

“It’s all in their control,” he said. “We feel we are overburdened. It’s 100 per cent in their control.”

He says there’s not much difference between most of the businesses in West Carleton and the rest of the city.

“We are businesses located in a rural area,” the CRCBIA executive director said. “Not a ‘rural business.’”

Bolivar says starting a business in Ottawa is overly complicated.

“What we see is more and more businesses coming to the area and it takes two years to get a building permit,” he said. “You can talk to anyone looking to build anything. The uncertainty of the timing on approval is the most frustrating thing and we see this often in the corridor. The capital isn’t necessarily the problem.”

Bolivar says because there is no water or sewer serving the Carp Road corridor that adds more challenges for businesses looking to get permission to build in the area.

“They come and then they go away,” he said. “Despite that, growth in the corridor is above the city average. But I look at it as opportunities missed.”

Bolivar says a more streamlined permit process “would be an economic development builder for the city all by itself.”

The rural economic development strategy is moving forward in line with the city’s efforts to re-write the Official Plan and Bolivar says it’s an important time for West Carleton businesses.

“Now is the time to really do some hard work and get it right,” he said. “It’s a very important time for the corridor.”