Ottawa Citizen letters to the editor for Tuesday, Aug. 18, 2026.
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“They paved paradise and put up a parking lot” are the lyrics of one of Joni Mitchell’s classic songs and they could help explain one of the reasons there is so much flooding in our city.
Rain water has to go somewhere. A lot of it goes into sewers, but a lot has to be absorbed into the ground.
To create more housing, the city is allowing infills almost anywhere there is an empty plot of land. People are subdividing their lots and putting up an additional dwelling, or they are demolishing their small home on a large lot and putting up two or more monster homes.
Water which used to be absorbed on this land must now go someplace else. With no upgrades to the sewer system to accommodate these new buildings, the water ends up flooding people’s homes.
There should be a moratorium on new infill dwellings until the city councillors and engineers can guarantee that the sewer system can handle the new load being placed upon it.
You report that, according to the Fraser Institute, the average family spent last year 41.9 per cent of their income on taxes, whereas in 1961 the total tax bill absorbed only 33.5 per cent of their income.
I regret to have to add that this is definitely false news and wilfully misleading. There were no Medicare and Canada Pension Plan in 1961, and seniors got no OAS benefits until they reached the age of 70. For a proper comparison of a family’s situation between then and now, one would have to add to the 33.5 per cent of 1961 several percentage points for medical care and pension saving.
The “Baby Bonus” was, in 1961, $6 per child under the age of 10, $8 per child up to the age of 16 and nothing per child between ages 16 and 18. Adjusted for cost of living, that was a maximum $76.80 per month in today’s money paid in 1961, whereas last year the maximum CCB was $573.58 per month for each child aged 6 to 17.
I gloss over other mistakes in the Fraser Institute’s propaganda. You have here enough to publish credible news in place of false news.
When he was a banker in London, Mark Carney was a staunch environmental advocate. When he was the United Nations Special Envoy for Climate Action and Finance, he certainly was just as much so. When he campaigned to succeed Justin Trudeau as leader of the Liberal Party of Canada in early 2025, he still was.
It was after the general election of April 28, 2025, which the Liberals won by a minority, that he changed.
