Interview with Bill Carroll about City of Ottawa Notifications for High Water Usage
June 12th, 2025
Yesterday morning on CFRA, Bill Carroll highlighted a question brought up by the public: Why doesn’t the City automatically sign people up for high water usage alerts?
A lot of folks don’t even know these alerts exist until they get hit with a huge bill from a leak or issue they didn’t catch in time. These alerts can notify you when your water use suddenly spikes, and they could save you hundreds of dollars.
So yesterday at Council, I submitted an inquiry to City staff asking:
Can we turn these alerts on for everyone by default?
If not for people with paper bills, what about those signed up with My Service Ottawa?
I hope to make sure people are protected before there’s a problem, not after.
To turn on these alerts, residents with MyServiceOttawa accounts and are receiving paperless billing can register for consumption alerts by signing into their account and selecting “alert subscription.”
The system can notify users by email when usage is consistent over seven days, exceeds average daily use, or surpasses a set threshold. Residents can also track daily and hourly water use and compare past bills.
A lot of folks don’t even know these alerts exist until they get hit with a huge bill from a leak or issue they didn’t catch in time. These alerts can notify you when your water use suddenly spikes, and they could save you hundreds of dollars.
So yesterday at Council, I submitted an inquiry to City staff asking:
Can we turn these alerts on for everyone by default?
If not for people with paper bills, what about those signed up with My Service Ottawa?
I hope to make sure people are protected before there’s a problem, not after.
To turn on these alerts, residents with MyServiceOttawa accounts and are receiving paperless billing can register for consumption alerts by signing into their account and selecting “alert subscription.”
The system can notify users by email when usage is consistent over seven days, exceeds average daily use, or surpasses a set threshold. Residents can also track daily and hourly water use and compare past bills.
Launch of the Agile Government Working Group
March 11th, 2025
March 11th, 2025
The launch of the Agile Government Working Group (AGWG) that was created as part of the City of Ottawa’s 2022-2026 Mid-term Governance Review.
The focus of this Working Group is to streamline City processes to ensure the public can access programs and services in a timely and effective way.
The work will be complementary to that of the Service Review Working Group (SRWG), which has been focused on finding cost savings, as well as new sources of revenue to fund Term of Council priorities and to address existing and emerging budget pressures.
Taken together, the mandates of the AGWG and the SRWG reinforce the City’s commitment to service excellence and continuous improvement – key pillars of our organizational culture.
The 2025 Work Plan
The AGWG is responsible for overseeing an annual work plan of continuous service improvement (CSI) initiatives. In 2025, this will include the following projects that are currently underway:
In addition to the above, the AGWG will have an opportunity to report on other CSI initiatives that are being undertaken across the organization, many of which were identified as a part of the Service Review engagement process that was launched in 2023.
The Agile Government Working Group
The focus of this Working Group is to streamline City processes to ensure the public can access programs and services in a timely and effective way.
The work will be complementary to that of the Service Review Working Group (SRWG), which has been focused on finding cost savings, as well as new sources of revenue to fund Term of Council priorities and to address existing and emerging budget pressures.
Taken together, the mandates of the AGWG and the SRWG reinforce the City’s commitment to service excellence and continuous improvement – key pillars of our organizational culture.
The 2025 Work Plan
The AGWG is responsible for overseeing an annual work plan of continuous service improvement (CSI) initiatives. In 2025, this will include the following projects that are currently underway:
- the Service Ottawa service request initiative, which will enhance the public’s ability to track service requests and strengthen support to Councillors’ offices in managing constituency work;
- the development review process within the Planning, Development and Building Services Department, to streamline the process for development approvals; and
- the parks planning process within Recreation, Cultural and Facility Services, focusing on expediting design and delivery of park projects and increasing the dialogue with Councillors on ward-based projects.
In addition to the above, the AGWG will have an opportunity to report on other CSI initiatives that are being undertaken across the organization, many of which were identified as a part of the Service Review engagement process that was launched in 2023.
The Agile Government Working Group
- Mayor Mark Sutcliffe
- Councillor David Brown
- Councillor Allan Hubley
- Councillor Catherine Kitts
- Councillor Stéphanie Plante