An expert in natural disasters says the City of Ottawa should be buying up homes in flood-prone areas, and turning them back into green space.
Glenn McGillivray, from the Institute for Catastrophic Loss Reduction, tells CFRA's News and Views with Rob Snow that it does save money in the long run.
“There’s a perception that these buyouts are costly, but we can show that inaction is far more costly,” McGillivray says. “Over the course of many decades, you’re going to be going through this scenario over and over again.”
He admits that the notion is politically unpopular.
“People move to these places because they’re nice,” he says. “They live next to a river because the view is fantastic. It’s not so great when it floods, but oddly enough, they want to stay there, even after the devastation. So, it’s not popular to buy out.”
But he says it’s not unheard of.
“It’s being done in Cape Breton,” he says. “That municipality got hit with floods last Thanksgiving. They are buying out 18 high-risk homes and they are bulldozing those homes and the owners got fair market value for the properties.”
“We did it in the Toronto area way back in 1954, after Hurricane Hazel,” McGillivray adds. “81 people were killed by the floods related to Hazel. A lot of the neighbourhoods were bought out and were converted to parkland. And those parks flooded last week, in the same rainfall Ottawa got. There was no property damage and no loss of life.”
McGillivray says the City can’t turn back the clock on the current flood, but going forward may have to make some tough decisions.
“We really have to think about avoidance going forward, and that would mean perhaps being a little tough and making some decisions not to rebuild in a flood plain.”
Speaking on CFRA's Ottawa Now with Evan Solomon Mayor Jim Watson said he would not approve new developments in flood plains.
"My view is we should not be approving any new, permanent housing on flood plains," he said. "You're not going to get insurance, it's going to end up costing taxpayers a lot of money and it's going to cause a lot of grief."