Havenbrook Tenants Fight Back Against Medallion: Mould, Leaks, Paid Visitor Parking, and Landlord Negligence

On Saturday November 25th, ACORN members of Havenbrook came together to fight back against the unlivable conditions that were brought to them by Medallion Corporation.

ACORN members gathered a total of 52 signatures to the petitions attached (combined with the building adjacent to the town home complex, 75 Havenbrook Blvd), as well as 12 work orders in total, requesting for the URGENT removal of PAID visitor parking signs (isolating tenants from friends and family). In lieu of the PAID visitor parking, tenants have suggested to return to visitor parking permits, or at least giving the ability to get up to two visitor parking passes per week. ACORN members also experienced mould, disrepair, and appliances taking more than a month to be replaced.

During our peaceful protest, it took seven cop cars to fight back against our small but mighty crew. All these resources were spent on the police budget, and not RentSafeTO which ultimately caused the peaceful protest in the first place. The mailbox of the townhome complex was in fact too small to fit in multiple work orders, which speaks volumes about the capacity they have to fix building issues at all. ACORN members of 61-67 Havenbrook Blvd were also supported by tenants at 75 Havenbrook Blvd, and were unable to access their own building when requesting to deliver the package of work orders, petitions and letters to the superintendent. So to head office it goes!

We also got two press hits! A CTV news clip of the action in the North York neighbourhood, as well as some great commentary about City funding. The story pointed to the lack of funding in the RentSafeTO budget (a win for us!), also calling to Olivia Chow about how we can make RentSafeTO a better system – one of our big municipal campaigns!