Housing

Ottawa ACORN's campaign for a landlord registry similar to Toronto's RentSafe bylaw is based on over a decade’s worth of community organizing, as well as the countless experiences of our low to moderate income members shared through forums, phone calls and home visits. For the past 13 years, ACORN organizers have gone door-to-door in low-income neighbourhoods, where the state of people’s housing remains their number one concern. ACORN sees the implementation of a landlord registry as an opportunity to address the gaps in our current property standards system; to ensure that everyone’s right to housing is protected and that every tenant has a healthy home.

Successful energy retrofits can specifically benefit residents of low‐income apartment buildings. Programs like TowerWise show that retrofits can lead to a 30% reduction in energy and carbon usage. Energy efficiency programs can also have up to a 2:1 cost‐benefit ratio. Retrofits of low‐income housing can potentially result in the co‐benefits of carbon reduction, energy efficiency, and costs savings, as well as positive health outcomes. On a macroeconomic level, retrofits can reduce the need for government spending on health and energy subsidies, which can be redirected to other types of social spending for low‐income Canadians.

Ottawa ACORN members are in the final sprint for their campaign for landlord licensing. After convincing city council to include landlord licensing as part of the City's "regulating rental accommodations" review, members have organized Tenant Speak Outs, days of action at City Hall, door knocked in bad apartment buildings, released reports, engaged the media and have met with the City's consultants three times. The consultants from Maclaren Group have released their report on policy options for housing conditions and are asking for feedback before submitting their recommendations to City Hall. 

 

Read Ottawa ACORN's response here: 

This collection of tenant testimonials shows that the City of Ottawa needs to do more to improve housing conditions.

 

Tenants are living in substandard conditions without the necessary support to allow them to stand up to landlords and have their needs met. The Property Standards By-law has more procedural steps and delays than most by-laws in addition to any notice of violation being unenforceable.

 

The City's review on regulating rental accommodations is a good first step in addressing tenants' very real concerns regarding the state of their housing. It is Ottawa ACORN members' hope that this sample of housing horror stories will demonstrate to our city that substandard housing conditions is a systematic issue that warrants urgent attention. We need landlord licensing NOW!