ottawa is the capital of canada and is part of the province of ontario. it is south of the ottawa river. in 2004, there were about 808,391 people in the city. the region has about 1,146,790 people. the mayor of the city today (since december 2010) is jim watson. ottawa is in the ottawa valley on the border with the province of quebec which is divided by the ottawa river. ottawa is the fourth largest city in canada and the second largest city in ontario (after toronto). ottawa is the only officially bilingual city in canada, where the english language and the french language are official languages and have equal status. every official sign in the city is, as a result bilingual. the reason for this bilingual status, is not only because ottawa borders the french-speaking province of quebec, the city itself has a large french-speaking minority.