AGLC hands probe of $1.7M house contest to Mounties
A provincial regulator says its investigation into whether a southern Alberta woman is allowed to give away her $1.7-million home in a letter-writing contest has been turned over to local police, after Alberta Gaming, Liquor and Cannabis determined the contest wasn’t in its jurisdiction.
But RCMP say they’re not currently looking into any potential illegalities surrounding the contest.
Last month, Millarville resident Alla Wagner started a contest called “Write a Letter, Win a House” and has since been bombarded by applicants hoping to win the sprawling home in the small community southwest of Calgary.
The AGLC later said in a statement it was performing “a full review into the legality of the contest.”
A spokeswoman for the provincial regulator said Thursday the matter was turned over to Turner Valley RCMP. “Basically, it’s not under our purview because there was no licence or anything. It’s not an actual raffle,” said Chara Goodings. “It isn’t an actual lottery so we don’t have anything to do with it . . . It’s out of our hands now.”
Goodings said a group of law enforcement officers, comprising representatives from various police services in Alberta, are seconded to the agency for investigations.
“Basically, once we say this isn’t ours, they then take over and start looking to see if there’s anything, and that has nothing to do with us,” she said.
But Const. Mike Hibbs, a spokesman for the RCMP, said Mounties weren’t actively looking into possible wrongdoing. “As of right now, we have a file open but we’re not investigating anything,” he said. “We’re just waiting for (the AGLC) to let us know what exactly is going on there.”
Unable to find a buyer for her home in the current economy, Wagner said she decided to use the contest as a creative way to downsize.
Contest rules state the competition will be cancelled if Wagner finds a buyer for the home before a winning entry is chosen, resulting in a refund of all entry fees. The total of all contest entry fees must also reach the home’s listed value of $1.7 million or the contest will be cancelled.
She is asking entrants to compose an explanation, in no more than 350 words, of why they should be the newest residents of the property. It costs $25 to enter.
Wagner said she was surprised the AGLC would launch an investigation into the contest at all. “According to my lawyer, AGLC has no jurisdiction over this,” she said. “There isn’t illegality to this, according to my lawyer. There is case law.”
She said Thursday that she plans to extend the deadline of the contest, which was supposed to run three months, due to an overwhelming amount of backlog she’s faced in processing payments and reading letters.