RIDEAU LAKES — Rideau Lakes council has amended its direction on road naming, adding municipal staff as a formal trigger for when road naming or renaming issues may be considered.
At its Feb. 17 committee of the whole meeting, council reconsidered a motion first brought forward in July 2025 that sought to narrow road renaming to cases involving true duplicate road names within the township.
During discussion, councillors raised concerns that the wording was too restrictive and could prevent the township from addressing roads that are not true duplicates but still present problems.
Coun. Dustin Bulloch said he saw the need for guardrails but worried the motion limited council’s ability to respond to legitimate concerns.
“I’m concerned with some of the wording in here, in particular where we’re restricting our ability to make changes,” Bulloch said. “Staff would only be able to suggest changes that have to do with truly duplicate road namings in the township.”
Bulloch said other situations could fall outside that definition, including numbered private roads.
“I think those numbered roads are worthy of our time,” he said. “I just don’t want to see us restricting ourselves to the point where it’s going to become very difficult to do this at all.”
Coun. Jeff Banks said the township had already spent years dealing with divisive road renaming debates that created more problems than they solved.
“There’s no need for it whatsoever,” Banks said. “Every time we had one of these, it takes six or eight months before it gets changed in Google Maps.”
Banks said emergency services have not raised safety concerns under the current system.
“I have absolutely no idea what the problem is, because the police can find it, the fire can find it, the ambulance can find it,” he said. “If (people) can’t find it. Maybe they need to read a map.”
CAO Shellee Fournier suggested a wording change to allow action not only for true duplicates, but also where a road creates confusion or risk within township boundaries.
“For clarity, would it help if we put the word ‘or’ right here?” she asked.
Later in the discussion, Bulloch proposed adding municipal staff as an additional trigger for road naming or renaming requests.
“If you could add something that allows us as the township to suggest changes,” he said. “Right now, there’s nothing there.”
Coun. Paula Banks, who moved the amendment, said she was willing to accept that change but opposed expanding the process to resident driven requests.
“I don’t want to allow each road to bring forward an idea to change their name unless they have 100 per cent of that road association in agreement,” she said. “We’re right back into neighbours fighting neighbours over road names, and that’s what we dealt with for two or three years.”
Council agreed to add municipal staff to the list of bodies that can support a road naming or renaming request.
As amended, the motion directs staff to update the road naming policy so that changes are generally limited to true duplicate road names that create confusion or risk, unless supported by a written recommendation from emergency services, the United Counties of Leeds and Grenville, a third party agency such as Canada Post, or municipal staff.
With no opposition raised following the amendment, the motion carried.
Staff have been directed to complete the policy update as time permits, recognizing other municipal priorities, but within the 2026 year. It will be brought back to council for final approval.
Keep connected to your community—Read the latest Rideau Lakes news.
For all Rideau Lakes council and committees meetings, visit their website.
