Scarborough tenants call for landlord licencing system

MIKE ADLER

May 24, 2007

Three years ago, social activists knocked on Marva Burnett's door and asked if her Scarborough Centre apartment building had any problems.

Yes, it turns out. "Roaches everywhere, rats too. The walls crumbling, units flooding, garbage all over the place," she recalled this week.

Burnett joined the social-activist group, ACORN, toured buildings in different parts of the city and found many had a host of issues Burnett said are rooted in landlord neglect. "Everywhere it's the same."

But this week, Burnett and other ACORN members were among the few people at Scarborough Civic Centre who came to discuss possible city strategies for enforcing standards in multi-unit apartments.

Though people could comment on 10 ideas - the most popular to emerge in months of separate meetings with landlords, tenant groups and city staff - there was no presentation and no politicians on hand.

A licensing system for apartment buildings or landlords, perhaps similar to one now used for Toronto restaurants, is one of the possible outcomes.

The city studied such systems in 2004. It shelved the idea because the province didn't give the city power to license buildings, but the City of Toronto Act puts that power in its hands, said Fenicia Lewis, a senior policy and research officer.

More on the proposals, on which staff will submit a report sometime this summer, is available at www.toronto.ca/licensing

Until June 8, residents can send comments to mrab@toronto.ca or leave them on a 24-hour phone line at 416-392-5461.

The city could do much more to protect tenants from bad landlords and a licensing system is a must, Burnett said.

"To me, it's basic. You have to have a license to have a pet," she argued.

Burnett also supports another idea on the table: have each landlord pay into an escrow account the city can use to pay for repairs if a building isn't maintained.

ACORN, however, wants tenants to be able to pay all rent into the escrow accounts, allowing a kind of legal rent strike in bad buildings.

"Without that, the landlord licensing system doesn't really have any teeth," Burnett said. "This is what the system needs right now because it's broken."

But Ward 39 Councillor (Scarborough-Agincourt) Mike Del Grande said he's not convinced of that and wants to see the report first. "You have to look at everything and ask tough questions."

Brad Butt, president and CEO of the Greater Toronto Apartment Association, said the city already has power to go into buildings, do repairs and recover the costs through property tax bills.

A licensing system is a "revenue grab" open to "political" decision-making and won't necessarily ensure repairs are made, he said this week.

The industry, including owners of 160,000 apartment units the GTAA represents, wants a system where an arms-length group helps landlords police themselves, functioning much like Ontario's program for new home-buyers.

Such inspections would be cheaper and more efficient than those done by the city, Butt said. "We know our buildings better."

The city has 120 municipal licensing and standards officers checking everything from driveway width to lawns. It doesn't have a specific team inspecting apartments.

Waqar Khan, a youth worker in Scarborough's Kingston-Galloway area who was at the Scarborough Civic Centre session, said he likes the restaurant licensing system because it's easy to follow. Licensing apartment buildings makes sense, he said. "Prospective tenants looking at renting can use that as a tool."

Khan added many of the youth he works with live in substandard housing and don't know their rights as tenants. The city should target that age group with brochures and advertisements on public transit and other places youth are found, he suggested.