Tenants in Yellowknife building given less than 30 days to vacate

Two tenants of Yellowknife’s Franklin House say they lost nearly everything when their window air conditioning unit caught fire in May. Now they and others have been told to leave.

The tenants, Cindy and Louis, say the fire left them with only a collection of DVDs and some canned goods in their pantry – and those were later stolen when a door was left unlocked.

“I lost everything. My sewing stuff, everything,” said Cindy.

Now, the couple and all other tenants at Franklin House have been asked – with less than 30 days’ notice – to vacate the apartment building.

Cindy said a notice slid under their door on September 4 told them to leave their home by the end of the month.

The notice, which has been reviewed by Cabin Radio, stated that due to a fire in May, the building will need to undergo “a complete renovation and restoration.”

“To carry out these renovations safely and effectively, the building will be fully locked down after September 30,” the notice added.

The letter is signed by Franklin House’s owner, Range Lake Developments, which also owns several commercial buildings in Yellowknife. It did not mention any possibility of returning to the building once renovations are complete.

The NWT’s Office of the Fire Marshal told Cabin Radio through a spokesperson that it had not issued any direction to the building owner requiring tenants to vacate the building.

Cindy and Louis, who have lived at Franklin House for the past three years, don’t know where they’ll be sleeping next month.

“We’ve got nowhere to go,” said Cindy. (The couple asked to withhold their last names so they could more openly discuss the sensitive nature of their tenancy and housing.)

Range Lake Developments did not respond to Cabin Radio’s request for comment.

What are the tenants’ rights?

The NWT Rental Office oversees disputes between landlords and tenants.

In an email to Cabin Radio, the office said a landlord can apply under subsection 59(1) of the Residential Tenancies Act to terminate a lease if renovations will be so extensive that the landlord would need a building permit and for the property to be vacant.

The office would not disclose whether such an application was made and approved.

Under subsection 54(1) of the act, a landlord may provide as little as 10 days’ notice asking a tenant to leave, but only in specific circumstances where the tenant might be at fault, such as repeated non-payment of rent.

“A landlord would be required to make an application to a rental officer to terminate tenancy agreements for reasons not outlined in subsection 54(1),” a spokesperson for the rental office said.

Peter Adourian, a Yellowknife criminal defence and civil rights lawyer who has worked on housing issues, said Franklin House tenants are being evicted through no fault of their own.

“If the rental office permitted the eviction under section 59 [regarding renovations], then I trust the landlord and rental office have advised these dispossessed tenants of their statutory right of first refusal in subsection 59(4),” said Adourian.

If a landlord tells someone to leave because of major renovations, subsection 59(4) offers existing tenants exclusive priority to negotiate a new lease before the renovated unit can be put back on the open market.

But tenants have to know that right exists and apply for priority in writing before leaving their unit.

“This protects tenants who, through no fault of their own, must vacate a unit for repairs,” Adourian said of the subsection. “When the repairs are done, they have the first right to move back in – only once they forego that right can the landlord put the unit back on the open market.”

“If they aren’t informed of their rights, how can they exercise their rights?” Adourian added.

He said residents being provided with such little notice to vacate sets a dangerous precedent in Yellowknife.

“This has the potential to result in severe human suffering – a suffering that people in our city, full of in-your-face homelessness, cannot afford,” he said.

A state of disrepair

The two tenants say that early on May 29, when Cindy and Louis’ air conditioner caught fire, Cindy had fallen asleep in their living room and Louis, smelling smoke, came out to ask Cindy if she was cooking.

When they spotted the fire, they say Louis ran through the hallways of the first, second and third floors looking for a fire extinguisher.

When one wasn’t found, Cindy described trying to use a wet cloth to put out the fire, which resulted in second-degree burns on her toes. (The tenants’ accounts of the fire could not be independently confirmed.)

The couple said their landlord moved them into a different unit in the building following the fire. In that unit, Cindy said, they haven’t had access to hot water. To take a bath, they boil pots of water on the stove and pour them into the tub.

Maintenance and repair requests to their landlord largely go unaddressed, they said, while pests have been a serious issue.

“You won’t believe how many cockroaches are in here,” Cindy said. “Everything has to be in a Ziploc bag.”

Another former Franklin House tenant who lived in the building until March of this year told Cabin Radio roaches were “literally everywhere” in the building and there were issues with bedbugs on the first floor.

Cindy and Louis say they’re receiving some assistance as they try to navigate their housing situation.

Still, they said, they aren’t sure where they’ll end up come October 1.