MOTHER OF 8 AND LANDLORD AT ODDS OVER WHETHER HAMILTON APARTMENT BUILDING’S CONSTRUCTION IS DEMOVICTION
Ubah Shire says her third-floor unit at Ventura Towers in downtown Hamilton has been her family’s home for more than a decade, but most of her eight children have been staying at friends’ houses because she says the apartment has been without heat, water and power for weeks. The 48-year-old Somali-Canadian is accusing the landlord of breaking the law and not doing enough to relocate them, as has been done with other families in the building due to construction. She...
read moreA LANDLORD HIKED RENTS AGAIN AND AGAIN. CANADA’S HOUSING AGENCY REWARDED HIM EVERY TIME
In the year after the final tenants living in a rundown pair of apartment buildings on Victoria Road in Dartmouth, N.S., left for good, many of their units have been transformed with granite countertops, stainless steel appliances and subway tiled kitchens. Those renovations have also seen advertised rents double, far beyond the reach of former residents like Edward Greek, a 58-year-old on social assistance who lived for six years in a $550-a-month bachelor unit. Since his eviction in late...
read moreNOVA SCOTIA EXTENDS ‘RENOVICTION’ BAN
Nova Scotia’s ban on landlords ending a residential lease for the purpose of renovations — or “renovictions” — has been extended. According to a release Friday, the extension is until the state of emergency ends or the ban is repealed, whichever comes first. Colton LeBlanc, the province’s minister of Service Nova Scotia and Internal Service, said in the release that the ban was being extended so “our most vulnerable citizens continue to be protected during the...
read moreSUPREME COURT OF CANADA DISMISSES CHALLENGE OF NEW WESTMINISTER’S RENOVICTIONS BYLAW
The Supreme Court of Canada has backed the city’s efforts to deter renovictions. According to a press release from the City of New Westminster, the Supreme Court of Canada informed the city on Dec. 9 that it had dismissed an application for leave to appeal the city’s rental units bylaw amendment. That decision followed a previous ruling by the BC Court of Appeal, which upheld the city’s right to adopt the bylaw amendment to deter the practice of renovictions and to help preserve affordable...
read moreP.E.I. DECLARES MORATORIUM ON ‘RENOVICTIONS’ FOR 2 YEARS
Prince Edward Island has enacted a two-year moratorium on what have become known as “renovictions” — evictions of tenants by their landlords in order to renovate their units. Politicians from all parties have acknowledged that the practice, allowed under the province’s Rental of Residential Property Act, is sometimes used by landlords to skirt around provincial rent controls. “What it means is that, immediately, there is a halt on people coming home and finding eviction...
read moreCITY OFFERING FORGIVABLE LOANS TO LANDLORDS TO RENOVATE UNITS, KEEP THEM AFFORDABLE AND HOUSE HOMELESS FAMILIES
To move some of the hundreds of families living in hotels, motels and other forms of emergency shelter in Ottawa into more permanent homes, the city is making $1 million available and looking to landlords with family-sized units to step up to the plate. Through the Ontario Renovates program, the city is offering loans of up to $50,000 per unit for upgrades, repairs and accessibility modifications to landlords who agree to rent those units to families in the emergency shelter system. The...
read moreTENANT GROUP, NEW OWNERS SQUARE OFF OVER VANIER ‘RENO-VICTIONS’
A group of holdout tenants from two Vanier apartment blocks say they’re being unfairly “reno-victed” from their homes by the buildings’ new owners. The owners, however, say they’ve done their best to accommodate tenants and that the buildings were infested with rodents and bed bugs and had been flagged by the Ontario Fire Marshal for “numerous fire safety issues.” Several of the residents have lived in the two six-unit buildings at 249 and 253 Pères-Blancs Avenue for more than 30 years.Mark...
read moreOVERHAULING CANADA’S BUILDINGS COULD ADD $48B TO THE ECONOMY
A “renovation wave” to decarbonize Canada’s buildings could not only make homes more livable, but inject $48 billion into the Canadian economy over the next 20 years. That’s according to a new report by the Pembina Institute, a non-profit clean energy think tank, which also finds the upgrades could create 200,000 jobs while making a sufficient dent in carbon emissions. Nationwide, the federal government says as much as 17 per cent of emissions comes from buildings. Retrofits, which are...
read moreMONTREAL IS GETTING $100M TO RENOVATE OVER 500 LOW-RENTAL HOUSING UNITS
Montreal has been granted $100 million to renovate more than 500 low-rental housing units (LRH) across the island. In a Wednesday afternoon press release, the Canada Mortgage and Housing Corporation announced the deal. In collaboration with the Quebec and Canadian government, the Office municipal d’habitation de Montréal (OMHM) says 517 units will be renovated, several of which are “currently boarded up.” Depending on the scope of the renovations required in the various buildings, the work...
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