Report to/Rapport au :

Planning and Environment Committee

Comité de l'urbanisme et de l'environnement

and/et

Agriculture and Rural Affairs Committee

Comité d'agriculture et des questions rurales

and Council / et au Conseil

28 May 2007 / le 28 mai 2007

Submitted by/Soumis par : Nancy Schepers, Deputy City Manager /

Directrice municipale adjointe,

Planning, Transit and the Environment / Urbanisme, Transport en commun et Environnement

Contact Person/Personne Ressource : Richard Kilstrom, Manager / Gestionnaire, Community Planning and Design / Aménagement et Conception communautaires, Planning, Environment and Infrastructure Policy / Politiques d'urbanisme, d'environnement et d'infrastructure

(613) 580-2424, 22653 Richard.Kilstrom@ottawa.ca

City Wide

Ref N°: ACS2007-PTE-POL-0034

SUBJECT:

background paper on new growth

projections for 2006-2031

OBJET :

DOCUMENT D’INFORMATION SUR LES NOUVELLES PROJECTIONS DE CROISSANCE POUR 2006-2031

REPORT RECOMMENDATION

That the Planning and Environment Committee and Agriculture and Rural Affairs Committee recommend Council receive this report for information purposes.

RECOMMANDATION DU RAPPORT

Que le Comité de l’urbanisme et de l’environnement et le Comité d'agriculture et des questions rurales recommande au Conseil de prendre connaissance du présent rapport.

BACKGROUND

Projections of the city's long-term future growth are typically revisited after the results of each five-year Census become available. The most recent projections were adopted by Council in November 2001 and are the basis for the current Official Plan (OP).

As previously reported, estimated actual population growth has been lagging the OP projection by an increasing margin. Between 2001 and 2006, actual growth has been 60 per cent of the amount projected and over the last two years has been only 50 per cent of projected.

As part of the review of the 2003 Official Plan, it is time to produce new projections for the City of Ottawa. In order to facilitate discussion of this important step, a Background Paper (Document 1) has been produced which sets out the proposed methodology for the projections, discusses some of the key assumptions proposed as inputs to the projection model, and provides examples of preliminary results.

DISCUSSION

The new projections will be undertaken by City staff and will include a peer review of the results by a qualified external consultant.

The methodology to be used is the Cohort-Survival Model, the same approach used for projections developed by the former Region and used by most large Canadian cities. This is in place of the econometric model used by consultants for the 2001 projections.

The Cohort-Survival technique applies annual births, deaths and in-migration to the starting year population by age and sex to arrive at projected populations for future years. In a growing city such as Ottawa, in-migration, specifically international immigration, is the most important driver of future population growth. Consequently, the proposed projection scenarios are strongly focused on immigration.

For 2006, the starting year of the new projections, it is proposed to use the City population estimate of 870,000 for mid-year 2006. A range of scenarios is proposed to be tested, each based on Ottawa attracting specific shares of immigration to Canada, which are summarized below. Draft projections for public consultation will be produced based on age/sex data from the 2006 Census, adjusted for undercoverage, which are to be released in mid-July. Further explanation of the basis for the scenarios may be found in the Background Report (Document 1).

Scenario 1: steady share of immigration. This proposes that Ottawa’s share of international immigrants to Canada remains at the average of the 1992-2004 period. This produces an annual net migration to Ottawa of approximately 5,600 persons, and would result in a projection for 2031 estimated to be about ten per cent lower than the current figure for 2021.

Scenario 2: low progressive increase in net migration. This proposes that annual average net migration increases by four per cent every five years, meaning that annual migration increases from 7,600 to 8,900 through the projection period. This would result in a 2031 figure estimated to be about five per cent lower than the current 2021 projection.

Scenario 3: high progressive increase in net migration. This proposes that annual average net migration increases by eight per cent every five years, meaning that annual migration increases from 7,800 to 12,500 through the period. This would produce an estimated population in 2031 roughly equal to the current projection for 2021.

The current projection in the Official Plan for 2021 is 1.19 million population. That projection also extended to 2031 and forecast a population for that year of 1.27 million. The most recent Ontario government projection for Ottawa, published in 2005, is slightly under 1.12 million for 2031.

The new 2031 projections also propose to look not just at the City of Ottawa but also at the Greater Ottawa-Gatineau Area (the metropolitan area including adjacent municipalities in Ontario and Quebec) to take into account the magnitude of the metropolitan economy and the extent of its commutershed. Preliminary projections for the Greater Ottawa-Gatineau Area, estimated at 1.3 million people in 2006, range from 1.6 to 1.8 million in 2031.

Projections will also be prepared for Ottawa households, housing requirements by dwelling type, and employment. These are not discussed in detail in the Background Report because the primary issue is the size of the population, which will largely determine the magnitude of the other variables. Briefly, projections of households and housing will be developed using the standard method of applying household and housing propensities (i.e. the percentage of persons in each five-year age group likely to head a household, and the percentage within each of those who are likely to occupy a single detached or other housing form) to the age structure of the projected population. Employment will be based on labour force participation rates by age and sex, with an allowance for unemployment and in-commuting to jobs located in Ottawa by residents of adjacent municipalities.

Further details on the proposed approach to the new projections are contained in the Background Report. Copies of the "Background Report on New Growth Projections for 2006-2031", in both English and French, are available at the City Hall Client Service Centre (publication #9-16 and #9-16f, respectively).

Next Steps

The revised projections will form the basis for an Official Pan amendment scheduled to go before Council in November. The new projections will form the basis for subsequent work in the Official Plan Review.

Major milestones over the coming months:

- July 17, 2007 – age and sex data from the 2006 census is released. These, adjusted for Census undercoverage, will be used to as inputs to the projection model to produce draft projections for consultation.

- September – public consultation on draft projections. These will be presented to Planning and Environment Committee, for information, on September 11.

- October 23 – taking account of comments received, a recommended projection in the form of an Official Plan amendment will be presented to Planning and Environment Committee.

- OP amendment to Council, November 14, 2007

CONSULTATION

Consultation on the proposed new projections will be undertaken in September through a white paper document and with external stakeholder groups and advisory committees.

FINANCIAL IMPLICATIONS

Funds for consultant peer review, estimated at $20,000, are available in Operating Budget account 112731, Demographic & Economic Analysis Forecasts.

SUPPORTING DOCUMENTATION

Document 1 Background Report on New Growth Projections for 2006-2031 (Distributed separately and on file with the City Clerk)

DISPOSITION

Staff to complete draft growth projections by end of August, arrange for peer review, and prepare for public consultations on these in September.