Trailer park residents fight eviction notice

CALGARY Fewer than a dozen residents who remain at a mobile home park in northeast Calgary argue they’re being forced out unfairly by the city.

The lawyer for the remaining trailer owners at Midfield Mobile Home Park has filed written arguments for a court appearance on Nov. 22 in a classaction lawsuit.

The city informed residents in 2014 that water and sewer lines at the site were too old and too costly to replace or repair.

Residents were offered $10,000 to help with relocation costs and an additional $10,000 lumpsum payment.

Most of them took the offer before the Sept. 30 deadline.

Lawyer Matthew Farrell says the city breached provincial law by neglecting the park’s infrastructure and then used aging pipes as the reason to evict.

Rudy Prediger, a retired truck driver, is one of the owners fighting to stay in the place he’s called home for 47 years. Prediger, 82, says the payment offered was far too small. “That will buy my porch,” he told CTV Calgary. “I don’t want money. I want to stay here in my home.”

Farrell said the city also violated the residents’ charter rights.

“By doing what they’re doing, the city is ... making the lives of these people harder and worse in an unfair way.”

The park originally had about 180 mobile homes. About 30 still stand, but only about half a dozen residents still live there.