12 wards are better

 

12 Wards? Not 24 – The Real Savings: A Proforma Estimate

In my last post I laid out the case for moving Ottawa from 24 wards to 12 using a spoke model that radiates out from Parliament Hill. The goal was simple: break down the urban-suburban-rural silos that make coordinated decision-making harder than it needs to be.

Today I want to put some numbers on the table. Not slogans. Not wishful thinking. A clear, evidence-based proforma of what reducing to 12 wards would actually save the City — year after year.

I’ve pulled the figures from the City’s own public documents: the 2025 Council Expenses Audit report, the Statement of Remuneration, and the latest budget materials. Here’s what the math shows.

Current Cost of 24 Wards

Every councillor currently carries two main buckets of cost:

1. Compensation & benefits — Salary is approximately $119,620–$120,000 in 2025, with employer pension and benefits adding roughly another $35,000–$45,000. Total compensation per councillor: ≈ $160,000.
2. Constituency Services Budget — This covers staff, office operations, communications, community events and constituent service. In 2025 this sits at $367,698 per councillor (up from $287,698 the year before after the mid-term review).

Total direct cost per councillor position: approximately $528,000 per year.

That’s the baseline.

Gross Savings from Cutting 12 Positions

Eliminate 12 councillor packages:

12 × $528,000 = $6.336 million per year in avoided costs.

That’s the headline number before we get realistic.

The Honest Adjustment: Larger Wards Need More Support

Here’s where most back-of-the-envelope calculations go wrong. If you simply halve the number of wards, the remaining 12 councillors will each represent roughly twice the population and geography. They will need more staff capacity, better data tools, and stronger constituent service infrastructure.

I’m assuming we give each of the remaining 12 councillors a meaningful increase in their Constituency Services Budget — a 40% uplift on average to handle the bigger workload.

That adds back roughly $1.76 million across the 12 remaining offices.

There are also modest efficiencies possible in the shared Council Administration Budget (central travel, some coordination, etc.). I’ve credited a conservative $400,000 in those areas.

Net Annual Savings

Gross avoided cost: $6.336 million
Less increased support for larger wards: –$1.76 million
Plus shared efficiencies: +$0.4 million

Net recurring annual savings: approximately $4.0 million to $5.5 million

My base-case number lands right around $5 million per year.

That’s real money. Every year. Forever — once the transition is complete.

One-Time Transition Costs

Any change of this scale has upfront costs:

• Full ward boundary review, legal work, mapping, public consultation and by-law changes: $400k – $1 million
• Systems updates and communications: $100k – $300k
• Staff transition management: Variable, but lower than you might expect because many constituency staff roles are tied to individual councillors’ terms

Total one-time cost: likely under $1.5 million

Payback period? One to two years. After that, the City banks the net savings every single year.

How This Fits With Better Governance

Reducing to 12 wards isn’t just about the money. It forces us to think differently.

With fewer, larger wards we can finally pair structural change with the tools I’ve been talking about — AI workflows that let councillors digest huge agendas quickly, data dashboards that show ward impacts in real time, and better cross-boundary coordination on files like transit, flooding, and east-end infrastructure.

A project manager’s instinct is always the same: design the organization so the work actually gets done efficiently, then equip people with the right tools. Right now we have 24 separate fiefdoms trying to manage a single city. That’s expensive and slow.

Why This Matters for Rideau-Rockcliffe and Ottawa

Residents in this ward — and across the city — are tired of watching money disappear into process instead of results. We just passed a 2026 budget with a 3.75% tax increase while still struggling with transit reliability, park maintenance backlogs, and development pressures.

Five million dollars a year in recurring savings doesn’t solve every problem, but it’s a serious down payment on better outcomes. It could fund real improvements in constituent service, faster responses on files that matter, or simply keep taxes lower than they otherwise would be.

The Bottom Line

This isn’t theory. It’s arithmetic based on the City’s own numbers.

Reducing from 24 wards to 12 using a spoke model delivers roughly $5 million in net annual savings after realistic adjustments for larger wards, with a payback in well under two years.

As someone who has run complex projects in hospitals and the private sector, I know the difference between structural reform that actually works and cosmetic change that just rearranges the deck chairs.

Ottawa deserves the real thing.

If you agree that it’s time for practical, measurable reform instead of business as usual, I’d appreciate your support. I’m knocking on doors every day in Rideau-Rockcliffe. Come say hello, share your priorities, or volunteer for a couple of hours.

The math is clear. The choice is ours.

Peter Karwacki
Candidate, Rideau-Rockcliffe Ward 13
peterkarwacki.blogspot.com

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Sources referenced in this post include the City of Ottawa Council Expenses Audit Report (2025 data), the 2025 Statement of Remuneration and Benefits, and related budget documents available on ottawa.ca. All figures are rounded for readability; exact numbers can be verified in the source reports.