Joe Cassey, 1926-2012

Last Friday, longtime Centretown resident Joe Cassey passed away.

I had the pleasure of meeting Joe when I interviewed him in 2009 for the video celebrating the 40th anniversary of the CCCA. The video was debuted at a special event in April 2010 where the four couples featured in the video (Joe & June Cassey, Nan and Tony Griffiths, Maureen and Mike Cassidy, and Elspeth and Jim Menendez) were each given a special CCCA Legacy Award for getting Centretown organized in the first place back in 1969. Here are Joe and June with their certificate:

As a result of that interview, his is one of the voices that tells the story of the community association's beginnings in 1968-1969 in the video:

Joe was born in 1926 in Port Arthur (now Thunder Bay) Ontario, and served in the Navy in World War II.

He subsequently moved to Ottawa in 1959, and in 1968 moved into a house at the end of Cartier Street with his wife June, where the couple became famous for giving the best parties in Centretown, for which Joe did most of the cooking himself. The house dates to the late 1800s and served as a branch of the Bank of Ottawa from 1911 to 1919:

Just months after moving in, Joe and June learned that their house might be demolished (as previously described in the video, starting at 2m50s) in order for the City to run offramps through the neighbourhood as a replacement to Pretoria Bridge. This was part of a greater scheme of proposed massive downtown road projects including the 17-lane downtown distributor.

The fight to protect the Pretoria Bridge (and the neighbourhoods) involved many existing and nascent community associations banding together to form the Federation of Citizens' Associations (described in the video at 9m19s). As Joe recounts in the Video, he felt it was important that these efforts be recognized, which they were with a plaque that named the associations following the reconstruction of the bridge in the '80s:

After helping to found the community association, Joe succeeded Mike Cassidy as alderman for Wellington Ward (the Eastern half of what is now Somerset Ward) in 1973-1974, where he worked alongside Britannia Ward Alderman Marion Dewar, another community-based representative who treated the position as a full-time job.

Joe worked on many issues, including improving conditions in rooming houses (he told me of a pair of young women who had to use a garbage bag for a door or be kicked out if they complain to the landlord) and raising awareness of gay issues.

In the following municipal election, Joe made an unsuccessful bid for the Board of Control, coming in fifth in the race for four spots. A 1974 issue of the Centretown News covered his candidacy, as well as that of Marion Dewar who did get on the Board of Control that year, eventually to become Mayor of Ottawa: (click to view full size)

In 1976, Brian Bourns, who played a central role in the development of the Centretown Plan and who is still active in the CCCA, was running for a second term in Wellington Ward. Joe instead put in a successful bid against incumbent alderman Don Lockhart in Capital Ward, just on the other side of the Queensway. Here is an ad of his that ran in the December 1976 Glebe Report (PDF) days before the December 6 election:

The same issue has a profile of Joe on page 6. Already by this time he had served on community associations, the FCA, the Air and Water Pollution Board, the Regional Housing Committee and the Youth Services Board.

As he told me in the interview (mp3, 0m36s, 585KB), he got some criticism for not living in the ward. June recounts, at the end of the clip, that Joe's response was "Do you want an alderman who works in the ward or one who sleeps in the ward?"

Joe later served as President of the Central Canada Exhibition Association (he credits Nancy Smith for saving the Aberdeen Pavillion from demolition) and as the founding Chair of the Ottawa Congress Centre.


I didn't meet Joe until long after all this activity, but every time I stopped by he was always in the mood to talk.

I visited him in hospital a month before he passed away and he was still on top of current events at City Hall, asking me one by one for the latest news on each of the files. He was quite a force and I am glad to have known him.


Arrangements are to be held at Hulse, Playfair and McGarry (McLeod and O'Connor) this evening and tomorrow. Details are at Legacy.com, as is the virtual guestbook. Donations in memory of Joe can be made to the University of Ottawa Heart Institute Foundation.

Monday & Tuesday: Charlesfort 20-storey Lisgar tower proposal

Charlesfort Developments is going to the Committee of Adjustment on February 17th, 2010, to seek 'minor variances' for a 20-storey residential tower across from City Hall.

Doug Casey, President of Charlesfort, wants to speak to the CCCA at tonight's meeting of the CCCA's Planning & Development Review Committee (5:30pm at Second Cup on Elgin and Lisgar). There will also be a broader community consultation tomorrow (Tuesday, February 9, 2010) at 5:30 p.m. in the Billings Room at City Hall.

As shown in the diagram below, the proposed building is nearly 2/3 heigher than the maximum allowed 37.0 metres. Casey says that the total floorspace approximates that of a big box that fills the entire permitted building envelope, citing the many such boxes in the neighbourhood. But that's just the theoretical box if you build to the maximum dimensions--one is not obliged to build to the maximum, and one is not entitled to exceed one limit merely for staying within another.

As for the site, it's the parking lots at the corner of Lisgar and Cartier, directly across from City Hall and the Heritage Building of City Hall. There's a two-storey red brick house (now serving as offices) next door.

The submission also says that the stepped nature of the building helps to break up its massing. This it does, to an extent, but it does so by reducing the minimum east and west side lot setbacks from 1.5m to zero for the first 13 metres of the site, and by reducing the rear (southerly) setback to 3.5 metres. The red brick house next door will be dwarfed.

The flatness of the front of the building is also evident in the elevation diagram:

I set up some diagrams of my own, based on how the surrounding context would look with this building nearby. The scale is approximate.

Here, for example, is a photo I took this summer of the trees in the island in front of City Hall's Lisgar street entrance. The lot in question is behind it

And here's how it would look (approximately) with the proposed Charlesfort building:

As for the height, I tried to approximate how it would fit into this scene taken from Albert Street. I think the building would actually be a bit taller than how I set it up here, but even so it's clearly taller than anything else in the Golden Triangle.

There are a few opportunities to learn more and get involved:

• Tonight: CCCA Planning & Development Review Committee meeting, 5:30 p.m., Second Cup, Elgin & Lisgar


• Tomorrow, Tuesday, February 9: Community meeting to present/discuss the proposal (organized by Coun. Holmes and Charlesfort). 5:30 p.m. at City Hall (Billings Room - second floor)


• Now to February 16th: Send your comments to the Committee of Adjustment (cofa@ottawa.ca), to Councillor Holmes (diane.holmes@ottawa.ca), and to the CCCA


• February 17th: Make a presentation at the Committee of Adjustment's Public Hearings at Ben Franklin Place Client Service Centre, 101 Centrepoint Drive.

CCCA Annual General Meeting, Wednesday October 21, 2009

The Centretown Citizens' Community Association is holding its Annual General Meeting on Wednesday, 21 October 2009 at St. Theresa Church on Somerset and Cartier, just down the street from the regular meeting place, City Hall.

Doors open at 6:30pm, meeting starts promptly at 7pm.

Here are some photos of St. Theresa's:



While the agenda isn't yet available on the CCCA website, the AGM will include a Centretown Heritage Project presentation, celebrating 40 years of activity since the Centretown Community Association (sic) was founded in 1969. I have been coordinating interviews with people who were involved at the very beginning of the association in order to document the early days.

Following the CHP presentation will be a presentation by Ian Lee, PhD, Sprott School of Business and Michael Tiger, Economist, on the proposals for Lansdowne Park, which is certainly an issue affecting Centretowners.

Anyone who lives or owns a business or property in Centretown can become a member of the CCCA (Centretown is defined as bounded by Bronson, the Queensway, the Rideau Canal, and the Ottawa River) and vote at the AGM for only $5. You can also run for the Board of Directors.

Come out and support your local Community Association!