Press Hits

Since a heat wave hit mainland Nova Scotia last week, Miriam Williams and her husband have been running six box fans in their highrise apartment, hoping some airflow would help ease the feels-like temperature of 40 C.

“There’s very, very, very little that we could do about it,” she said. “It was unbearable.”

In July, Williams joined tenant advocacy group ACORN’s protesters at the Halifax Common splash pad in a nationwide rally urging government action to tackle growing extreme heat risks. While regional demands vary, they all focus on indoor temperature caps for rentals and cooling subsidies.

Williams said while healthy youth can likely endure the heat, she can’t imagine how vulnerable people are coping.

“My thought really went to all the kids and the elderly folks in our building who are very much in the exact same situation where they’re struggling like this,” she said.

As Ottawa sweats through an unusually humid summer, a renter advocacy group is mobilizing to secure air conditioning units for its members through an undersubscribed city program—but has been concerned that more efficient heat pumps are priced out of reach for now.

In July, the Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now (ACORN)-Ottawa and allies won $100,000 in municipal budget for a pilot program that will provide 200 AC units to low-income tenants, the group wrote in a Facebook post. The units are available for low-income earners who are seniors, or have a medical condition that would be helped by cooling.

“We know this is just a drop in the bucket!” ACORN said at the time, adding that it would be demanding a province-wide air conditioning program next.

But as ACORN helps address an urgent health and safety issue this summer by connecting eligible residents with the AC program, better, more efficient technologies remain out of reach.

Des pannes d’eau chaude qui s’éternisent, des ascenseurs hors service, des infestations d’insectes et d’autres problèmes d’entretien qui persistent pendant des semaines. Alors que plusieurs locataires de London ont récemment dénoncé l’état de leur immeuble, une question se pose : à partir de quel moment les autorités municipales interviennent-elles pour faire respecter les normes immobilières?

Au cours des dernières semaines, plusieurs immeubles de London ont fait les manchettes. Sur la promenade Kipps, des résidents disent avoir été privés d’eau chaude pendant près de trois semaines, les obligeant à faire bouillir de l’eau pour se laver et faire la vaisselle. Dans un immeuble de London Middlesex Community Housing, une panne d’ascenseur a empêché certains occupants d’accéder à leur logement pendant plus de 24 heures. Une résidente atteinte de fibrose pulmonaire a même dû passer la nuit à l’hôpital, car ne pouvait accéder à son réservoir d’oxygène situé dans son appartement. Ces situations s’ajoutent à d’autres plaintes liées notamment à des infestations d’insectes et à des réparations qui tardent à être effectuées.

Prime Minister Mark Carney and Toronto Mayor Olivia Chow announced $2.7 billion on Wednesday towards building 18 housing projects over the next three years in a move aimed at adding thousands of new rental units to the market.

The breakdown of the funding includes $310 million that will go towards building roughly 1,900 homes on city-owned land through the Build Canada Homes federal agency — 700 of those will be supportive and affordable homes, while about 1,100 will be rent-controlled homes.

But it’s where the rest of the money is going that tenant advocacy groups are taking issue with.

Roughly $1.8 billion will be paid out in low-interest loans to private developers through the Canada Mortgage and Housing Corporation’s Apartment Construction Loan Program (ACLP), which can create roughly 3,700 rental homes in Toronto.

Residents of a Kipps Lane apartment complex say they’re growing frustrated over the lack of hot water in their building.

“Wake up in the morning, start boiling water to have your morning wash. You’re washing dishes, you need to boil your water, so it is time consuming,” explained Richard Gillespie, a tenant at 756 Kipps Lane.

And when it comes to showers, “Well let’s just say I haven’t had one in a bit,” he said.

Gillespie says the hot water in his mid-rise apartment building has been out for about three weeks, with the exception of one day in the middle when it was fixed temporarily.

On July 27, property owner SIREG Management Inc issued a written notice apologizing for the hot water interruption. The notice, posted throughout the building, went on to say, “Our Maintenance Team and specialized technicians have been working continuously to address the issue. However, due to the complexity of the repair, additional time is required to ensure the system is fully restored and operating safely.”

Residents of a London, Ont., apartment building say they have been without hot water for 12 days straight, with no timeline from property management about when it might be fixed.

The hot water at 756 Kipps Lane worked for a single day nearly two weeks ago, but quickly fell back into disrepair, having already been out for roughly five days, according to Richard Gillespie, who has been living in the building since June.

“It’s just frustrating,” he said. “You wake up, you start day, you’d love to have a shower before you go to work.”

“You can hop into an ice shower if you’re feeling up for it, but sometimes it’s not the most comfortable thing.”