Councillor calls for local strategy
Menard says city should prioritize jabs of front line workers, keep parks open
One city councillor is calling for a “made-in-Ottawa” approach to curbing the spread of COVID-19 that would prioritize the vaccination of front line workers and recognize the importance of keeping parks and their amenities open to the public.
Capital ward Coun. Shawn Menard said the city needs a more rational approach to COVID-19 than the stay-at-home order issued by the province Friday.
“That's particularly true of our vaccination rollout,” Menard said in an interview.
The city, he said, should prioritize daycare and education workers for vaccination along with those in congregate workplaces.
Menard vowed to raise the issue at Monday's board of health meeting where he intends to present research in support of his position.
His office staff examined city data that tracked community outbreaks between March 2020 and January 2021. The city defined a community outbreak as one involving two cases or more.
They found that 75 per cent of community outbreaks in Ottawa were connected to workplaces, with most (38.3 per cent) associated with the service sector.
The biggest recorded outbreaks were connected to an office workplace (42 cases) and a restaurant (18 cases), Menard said.
“In short,” Menard said, “workplaces are the most significant source of community outbreaks in Ottawa, and if we want to mitigate this source of transmission then we need to get serious about providing workers with the supports they need to stay home when they're ill, such as paid sick leave.”
He said mobile vaccination clinics at those workplaces — combined with provincial legislation affording employees paid sick leave — would go a long way toward controlling the pandemic.
Ontario Premier Doug Ford has consistently resisted calls to introduce paid sick leave, arguing that a federal government program, the Canada Recovery Sickness Benefit, covers workers who think they may have COVID-19. Critics say the federal program is too cumbersome and restrictive.
The city's COVID outbreak data, Menard added, suggests Ottawa's parks and outdoor spaces are not causes for concern.
His staff identified only three outbreaks in public settings with 15 associated cases of COVID-19.
“It's actually the opposite: They have been our reprieve,” he argued. “That's not where we're seeing the vast majority of transmission: They are by-and-large the safe spaces we should be opening up.”
As part of its six-week stayat-home order, the province announced that all baseball diamonds, soccer fields, tennis courts, pickleball courts, basketball courts, BMX parks and skate parks would be off-limits, along with all outdoor picnic tables.
Under pressure from pandemic-weary parents, Ford relaxed rules on park playgrounds Saturday, saying that children will be allowed to use them.
Ottawa Public Health warned park visitors to wear masks if they can't stay two metres apart.
“Please remember: While the risk of transmission outdoors is lower than indoors, it's not zero,” OPH warned.
The province's stay-at-home order also closed outdoor recreation facilities, including golf courses and tennis courts, prohibited outdoor social gatherings except with members of the same household, closed non-essential construction sites, and closed interprovincial border crossings to all but essential travel.
One online petition called “Let Ontario golf ” collected more than 18,000 signatures on the weekend. Another online petition that appealed to the government to restore Ontarians' ability to play golf and pickleball has collected more than 13,000 signatures.
At Falcon Ridge Golf Club, co-owner and general manager Steve Spratt said he was “clearly disappointed” that the government decided to close golf courses, particularly when there was no evidence that they had been the source of a COVID-19 outbreak.
“It's an outdoor activity that keeps people's minds off COVID while they exercise in the fresh air,” Spratt said. “But they've made this move and we've got to respect that.”
Spratt, former president of the National Golf Course Owners Association, said he had never heard of a COVID -19 outbreak being tied to a Canadian golf course at any time during the pandemic. “We've tried to make golf as safe an atmosphere as possible,” he said.
Golf, he noted, has never been more popular. “If we can get going on May 20, we can salvage the season,” he said. “We know that, when we get open, we'll have a lot of people coming out to golf.”
The Ottawa Tennis and Lawn Bowling Club announced its shutdown on the same day that it announced its opening.
On Friday morning, tennis club members were informed the club would open Saturday, three weeks ahead of schedule. That same afternoon, the club opening was cancelled because of the provincial stay-at-home order.
Although disappointed, executive director Maria Pierre-Noel said she hoped the government measures “will give us a better chance for a normal summer.”
Meanwhile, the National Capital Commission closed Queen Elizabeth Driveway along with the Sir John A. Macdonald and Sir George-Étienne Cartier parkways to traffic on the weekend to give cyclists, joggers and other active users more room to exercise. NCC CEO Tobi Nussbaum said the NCC understands the importance of mental and physical well-being.
The NCC said it will provide more information later this month on the parkway programming planned for the rest of the season, including for the Gatineau Park parkways.