Evicted tenants wage human rights fight
People of colour ousted for affluent white renters, Ottawa complaint says
Maha Jabur says she still suffers depression stemming from an eviction letter she received two years ago, telling her she only had a few months to vacate the three-bedroom unit where her family lived in Ottawa.
“We didn’t really have a choice. We lived there for a long time, then all of a sudden they’re telling us to leave. I got really upset and depressed. They put me under pressure and I didn’t know what to do,” says Jabur, 42.
Originally from Iraq, Jabur came to Canada in 2010 as a refugee from Syria.
She was one of as many as 550 people — most of them people of colour — who were forced out of their homes in 2018, following a decision by Timbercreek, a $10-billion asset management firm, to demolish an aging townhouse development in south Ottawa called Heron Gate Village.
The firm wants to construct nearly 60 new buildings and about 5,500 residential units. An Ontario Human Rights complaint was filed last year against Timbercreek, by lawyers and members of the Herongate Tenant Coalition on behalf of 37 people forced to leave the community in 2018, over 90 per cent of whom are nonwhite, including Jabur.
The complaint asks the human rights tribunal to determine whether a landlord has the right to “displace” a large group of tenants in a “low-income, family-oriented, racialized and immigrant community” to create a “predominantly affluent, adult-oriented, white community” in its stead.
“Landlords do not have this right in Ontario,” the complaint goes on to say, adding that such a move violates sections of the province’s Human Rights Code. The complaint demands $50,000 in damages for each of the applicants who say they were discriminated against when they were moved.
Meanwhile, tenants who still live in the older buildings on site — 2,000 to 3,000 people — are facing the prospect of moving.
The human rights complaint goes on to say that residents in the primarily white neighbouring community are the ones being lured by Timbercreek to the new development.
“(They’re) trying to attract residents from Alta Vista. We know Alta Vista, from government statistics and common knowledge, is overwhelmingly white,” lawyer Daniel Tucker-Simmons said in an interview.
“You’re trying to displace a community of colour, and attract and build a community of retiring, overwhelmingly white residents.”
Timbercreek, the same company that recently acquired the low-income West Lodge towers in Toronto’s Parkdale neighbourhood, denies it’s discriminating against anyone.
“Stating that some of the applicants are of Somali or Haitian origin, and that some are ‘ethnically Arab,’ does not infuse the applications with a basis for allegations of discrimination on grounds protected by the (Ontario Human Rights) Code,” Timbercreek says in its reply to the complaint.
“There must be facts pleaded which show some nexus between the ethnicity of the applicants and the actions of Timbercreek,” the company says, adding “no such facts exist.”
Timbercreek has promised that 20 per cent of units in the new 40-acre redevelopment will be affordable housing. The company says the development is likely15 to 25 years away from completion and will cost about $1 billion.
Also, the company has promised no further eviction notices will be issued unless affected tenants can “relocate to newly constructed equivalent units at the same rent.”
The secondary plan for the project is being reviewed by the city of Ottawa. A hearing for the human rights complaint, if held, likely won’t be until next year.
Disclosure documents are still being exchanged between the parties. A hearing would be scheduled once that process ends and they’re ready to proceed, or if the Human Rights Tribunal decides that all relevant documents have been exchanged.
A very large and complex case such as this would be expected to move slowly, even before the COVID-19 pandemic, Tucker-Simmons said.
“As far as I can tell, this case is a first of its kind in Canada. We undertook a pretty exhaustive search of case law and couldn’t find anything like it.”
The case is being closely watched by tenants at West
Lodge in Toronto and their advocates.
Residents of the towers, near Jameson Avenue and Queen Street West, fear the 150 or so vacant units in the buildings indicate that Timbercreek plans to turn them into luxury rentals.
Timbercreek denies that, saying it plans to rent the vacant units at market rates and is committed to a “long-term investment in West Lodge for all our residents.”
Heron Gate Village, a community of mainly townhouses and some highrises, was built in the 1960s by Minto Communities Canada. Timbercreek obtained the properties around 2013. The community, known for affordable rents, became a magnet for minority and low-income tenants, many of Somali and Middle Eastern origin.
“You could get a four-bedroom for about $1,400 a month, including utilities, so it was a very good place for a family, very spacious,” says Tucker-Simmons. “You’d be lucky to find a four-bedroom anywhere centrally for under $2,000 a month, maybe $1,800 if you were lucky.”
Timbercreek began developing part of the property in 2015. The company decided that many of the wood-framed townhomes had declined badly and needed to be knocked down for the “comfort, dignity and safety of residents.” Eighty homes were demolished that year, of which about 50 were occupied, Timbercreek says.
In another section of Heron Gate, 150 homes — of which 105 were occupied, according to Timbercreek — were demolished in 2018.
“It was a very difficult decision, not a decision made in haste, to relocate those residents,” said Colleen Krempulec, a senior spokesperson for Timbercreek, in an interview this past week. “But the fact of the matter is a good portion of those homes … reached the end of their viable life cycle.” The Heron Gate community has evolved in a manner that isn’t dissimilar from communities across the province and Canada, Timbercreek says in its reply to the human rights complaint.
“Individual residences and rental accommodations are renovated or demolished to be replaced by new construction. Such redevelopments are fundamental to the rejuvenation of urban environments, which would otherwise deteriorate,” it says.
“It is not denied that one of the underlying motivations of Timbercreek in its decisions to redevelop properties such as Heron Gate is the making of profit.”
It adds that the redevelopment of Heron Gate Village “increases the availability of housing in a central urban area. In combination with the inclusion in the redevelopment plan of affordable housing units suitable for families, the result will be a mixed-income community which offers significantly more affordable housing options than currently or previously available.”
Timbercreek says a relocation team was established to help residents find new homes after they were given five months’ notice of the moves. Many residents were relocated close to Heron Gate, it says, or came back to live in new buildings in a Heron Gate development called Vista Local.
It offers bachelor units starting at $1,395 and one-bedrooms at $1,635, the website for the units indicates.
But opponents say many of those forced out had to relocate outside of the community, and that rents at Vista Local are too pricey for most of them.
That includes former resident Jabur, who now lives close to Heron Gate but can’t afford the new units.
“They are too expensive for me. I have three children,” says Jabur, who receives government assistance.
Martine August, an assistant professor at the University of Waterloo’s School of Planning who is to provide expert evidence for the complainants, calls the displacement of lowincome residents and people of colour “clearly unjust.”
“To argue that we should have this system because (city) planning allows them to redevelop those homes — planning allows them to not replace the units for the same people at the same (rent), doesn’t mean that it’s right from the perspective of social justice and morality,” August says.
The human rights complaint argues that Timbercreek’s Heron Gate plan is consistent with a “broader model” of real estate development in Ontario that disproportionately affects people of colour, immigrants, people receiving public assistance and families.
According to the complaint, this model involves identifying real estate that is “undervalued,” displacing the existing low-income occupants, renovating or building higher-end rentals or condos, then marketing to a more affluent demographic.
“Timbercreek is not rebuilding same size/same rent for tenants,” says Josh Hawley, a member of the Herongate Tenant Coalition who lives close to the neighbourhood. “They are strategically reshaping the constitution of the neighbourhood in the interest of investment and profit.
“The only effective way to prevent Timbercreek from continuing with their plans is for tenants to refuse to move and stay in their homes,” Hawley added.
“Only then will we be able to effectively prevent displacement, and a deepening housing and homelessness crisis.”