Ottawa, ON – Ottawa Mayor Jim Watson is threatening to scrap city plans for a casino if the Ontario Lottery and Gaming Corporation doesn’t offer the same profit sharing deal as they did for Toronto.
Watson says he was shocked to hear that the OLG’s funding formula might be changed to give Toronto a bigger slice of the pie and sent a letter to OLG Chair Paul Godfrey on Friday.
“In November of 2012 the OLG confirmed that the payment formula will not be changed, yet all of a sudden we’re reading that it will be changed,” Watson said. “We want to be a good partner, we recognize the revenue that comes in that helps our infrastructure, education and health care but why should Toronto be treated better than any other municipality in Ontario?”
Watson says if the OLG is not willing to even things up by giving Ottawa the same revenue-sharing agreement as Toronto, he will recommend to council that the city withdraw from the casino bidding process.
If that were to happen, it would mean the Rideau Carleton Slots operation would stay open and perhaps go back to the original proposal which would add table games.
Here is a copy of the letter:
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No wonder !! Politicians are too cheap to spend their OWN money !!!
Who care what Ottawa wants, it’s as irrelevant a town as you’ll find anywhere.
Ottawa, lol.
The point is they are going against their word. I don’t care if it was Sarnia, they are not binding to the agreement.
Ha-ha-ha. Mr. Watson thinks Ottawa should be treated the same as Toronto. Ha-ha-ha. It’s almost as if he thinks it’s as important as TO. Ha-ha-ha. Good one.
Typical Toronto ‘Centre of the Universe’ comments so far. Jim Watson is simply responding to the typical ‘greed’ that Toronto gets as it has historically got most of the ‘goodies’ from Ontario taxpayers. Notice that Toronto is asking for MORE than everyone else. Ottawa and Niagara are simply asking for the SAME as everyone else. Give your head a shake Toronto….look in the mirror Mr. Greedy.
Ottawa Population: 883K. Toronto population: 2.6M
Gee, which do you think is the OLG’s top choice?
How about Mr Ford demands the same revenue from the Feds that they spend in Ottawa? Jim Watson’s greed overwhelms me. Toronto as a City has a lot of unique financial demands placed upon it and should have a larger piece of the revenue pie.