It’s been a tough year to be a landlord-side housing lawyer with a social conscience. Our tenant-side colleagues post horror stories of evictions happening by the dozen without tenants getting notice or benefiting from other procedural fairness protections. Continue reading “The other side of eviction — one co-op’s story shows the gaps in our system”
This post is an update to our April 9, 2020 blog post.
The Ontario Superior Court issued an Order on March 19, 2020, suspending evictions until the end of the calendar month in which the provincial state of emergency is terminated. In accordance with the Order, the Landlord and Tenant Board stated that it would be suspending all hearings related to evictions unless the matter is urgent, such as a serious and ongoing health or safety issue at the residential complex or a serious illegal act that occurred at the residential complex. Despite the suspension of non‑urgent evictions, Landlords were still able to serve eviction notices and subsequently file an eviction application.
The Reopening Ontario (A Flexible Response to Covid‑19) Act, 2020 became law on July 24, 2020. Section 17 of this statute states “Unless it has been terminated before this section comes into force, the COVID‑19 declared emergency is terminated and Ontario Regulation 50/20 (Declaration of Emergency) is revoked.” Therefore, as of August 1, 2020, residential evictions are no longer suspended. Continue reading “UPDATE: Some Helpful Clarifications from the LTB Regarding Evictions”
Due to the pandemic and the resulting lockdown, many individuals are spending more time at home. It’s unclear whether this has led to an increase in illegal activity or just an increase in witnesses, but either way our office is receiving more calls about how to handle illegal activity in a unit. As part of its response to the COVID‑19 pandemic, the LTB narrowed its scope for eviction orders and is hearing only those eviction applications that address urgent matters of health and safety or serious illegal activity. Housing providers looking to evict tenants or members who are causing serious problems may now be looking towards evicting on the grounds of illegal activity; but take heed, these are complicated and are always an uphill battle. Housing providers have to consider many factors before choosing this route, and often struggle to gather enough evidence.
New consequences of evictions for illegal activity
New changes to the Housing Services Act, which governs social housing in Ontario, came into effect in January of 2020 and further complicate evictions for illegal activity by raising the stakes even higher for tenants. A news release from the Ontario Ministry of Municipal Affairs and Housing boasted improvements to safety in community housing thanks to a new regulation. The brief states that the government is “sending a clear message that dangerous criminal activity is not welcome in community housing.” The changes allow community housing providers to turn away prospective tenants who have been previously evicted from community housing for illegal activities in the past five years. Continue reading “A New Consideration When Evicting for Illegal Activity”
UPDATE Aug 5, 2020: See the latest info here.
Update: the LTB has updated their website forms section to include the Request for Urgent Hearing Motion Form and Instructions for the Request for Urgent Motion Form. See our update for full details.
You may have heard that the LTB has suspended hearings related to eviction applications as well as the issuance of eviction orders. A recently posted update on their website clarifies that while they’re not hearing arrears or N5 or N5C applications, they will continue to hear serious cases in which an N6, N6C, N7 or N7C was served. It is not entirely clear from the update whether they will be proceeding with all of these applications or just those that they deem to be urgent.
We will continue to post updates on our blog as they become available. Continue reading “Some helpful clarifications from the LTB regarding evictions”
Many of our housing clients have been disappointed recently about the length of time it takes to conduct business at the Landlord and Tenant Board. Rest assured, we are doing our very best to push things along as quickly as we can. The LTB acknowledges the delay on its website:
Over past months, parties have experienced service delays at the Landlord and Tenant Board (LTB). The LTB continues to work with the government to improve its services. A number of experienced adjudicators have recently been reappointed and recruitment is under way to fill other adjudicator vacancies. On January 1, 2019, the LTB became part of the newly created Tribunals Ontario organization. A review will be conducted of all tribunals, including the LTB, to identify areas for improvement to make services more streamlined, cost-effective and efficient.
This is not new – the Toronto Star and the Globe and Mail both reported on the delay, and on the LTB admission of the problem, six months ago. We see no improvement since then.
Continue reading “The LTB has become slooooow. Is there relief on the horizon?”
We are now aware of 26 co‑op eviction decisions released by the LTB. Of those, we know that 17 settled at the Case Management Hearing stage. Case Management Hearings are conducted primarily in person, but also by telephone on occasion. Our experience at Case Management Hearings has been a positive one – the parties have come prepared to agree to repayment terms with an understanding of the consequences to co‑op members who default. Unfortunately, across the province the LTB has reported that two of the settlements have failed; in those cases, co‑op members who have agreed to settlements did not fulfil their terms and have been evicted as a result. But as far as we know the remaining 15 settlements are in place and working to keep co-op members back on track with payments.
Continue reading “More news from the LTB on co-op evictions”
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