Your city hall is building for temporary tents

Bonjour, Ottawa. Simone Okafor-Bouchard here, with your daily download from City Hall. We've been looking through the latest building permits, and something quite interesting, I think, popped up twice for the same location, which is a bit unusual.

It seems The Bani Hashi Society at 900 Eglinton Avenue East in Ward 3 has secured two separate permits to install five temporary tents each. One set is for June 16 to June 27, 2026, and the other, same number of tents, same address, for July 26 to August 6, 2026. Each permit, BP 3TEN 26-406 and BP 3TEN 26-407, is valued at $6,500. This is according to the recently issued building permits data.

Now, two permits for temporary structures at the same address, for different periods, suggests some very meticulous long-term planning. You don't often see a commercial permit for *temporary* tents getting this level of advance booking, bien sûr. It's like they've got their events scheduled out for a while, and the city is ready to facilitate that. What exactly is happening there that needs two separate eleven-day tent installations? That’s the kind of detail you don't find on the permits, but it makes you wonder. The real story is never on the Hill – it's always just off it.

Simone Okafor-Bouchard, MiTL Sports Desk, off the Hill.

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