Condo blaze sparks debate about no-smoking bylaws
Cigarette butt in plant blamed for $10M fire
Damage from a west-end condo fire earlier this week is now estimated at $10 million, Edmonton fire officials said Wednesday.
Initial estimates pegged the damage around $7 million to $8 million.
Fire crews were called to Park Place South Hamptons, at 1520 Hammond Gate, shortly before 1:30 a.m. Monday. The entire building — 186 suites with about 400 residents — was evacuated. Twenty of the units were destroyed, said Dennis Begoray, a condo board member.
Investigators determined a cigarette butt in a potted plant on the fourth floor caused the fire.
Should condos ban smoking?
Lawyer Robert Noce, a partner with Miller Thomson LLP and a Journal columnist, says he always tells boards to consider a no-smoking amendment when they are changing their bylaws.
“The drafting of that particular section would have to be broad enough to cover condominium property, hallways, the parkade, parking lots, individual units, balconies, every possible area,” he says.
If a smoking ban was instituted, how would it be enforced?
“No different than bylaws today that say no pets in your unit,” Noce says. “Someone will always attempt to sneak a cat or dog into their unit, and unless someone has seen them and can actually put evidence forward to support the breach, then someone may get away with it for a period of time.”
He says the bylaw requires buy-in from all the owners, and the ability of the corporation to go after people who violate it.
Why don’t most condos have a no-smoking bylaw already?
“A lot of developers don’t like to do that because they don’t want to restrict the number of people who will ultimately buy these units,” Noce says.
It’s also difficult to impose a no-smoking bylaw on existing condos. For example, current owners likely wouldn’t have to follow a bylaw amendment until the unit was sold and a new owner took over. The threshold to amend a bylaw in Alberta is also high, needing support from 75 per cent of owners.
Can the provincial government step in?
Yes, and it’s possible to do with Bill 13, which was put forward in the spring to amend the Condominium Property Act, Noce says.
“The government could look at making a blanket rule under the proposed legislation to ban smoking in every condominium corporation as well, without the need of individual condominium corporations dealing with this issue,” Noce says. “It’s not in the proposed amendment that was released earlier this spring, and it’s something they should perhaps consider, given the cost to society and to individual Albertans with respect to these tragedies.”
What can current condo owners do to protect themselves?
“In a condominium, there’s no legal requirement for you to buy contents insurance, so some people may have lost everything in this fire and no ability to recoup it,” he says.
Most condominium corporations have a base insurance, but he recommends people get insurance for their individual units, and any improvements they make to the unit, such as hardwood floors.