Following up on this post... At last night's meeting, city council voted unanimously to deny the application to convert 2141 Rae Street, the Viva Apartments, into condominiums. Councillors cited the appallingly low vacancy rate (o.5%) as one of the reasons driving their decision. Beyond that, the key factor was likely a petition presented by a Viva resident indicating that 17 residents from the 24-unit building were still opposed to the conversion and felt it would cause them significant hardship.
Council did approve the 15 Coventry Road conversion. However, the building owner, PR Investments, indicated they intended to only convert four of the building's 12 units into condos. The remaining eight would remain as rental suites, with funds raised from the sold suites going into building maintenance. Also, PR Investments indicated that they were offering all of their tenants lifetime tenancy agreements and would continue to rent out their units at below market rates. Coucillors felt that under these particular circumstances -- i.e., that the bulk of the units would remain affordable rental units -- they could in good conscience approve the conversion.
Expect more detail on the condo conversion issue in the next prairie dog.
1.27.2009
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4 comments:
Shocking! I guess they're already into re-election mode at city hall. "As of Jan. 26/09, I've been 'steadfast' (ugly, stupid Bush word) in my 'resolve' (another ugly Bush word) to defend the interests of Regina renters, while holding property managers accountable for their actions."
Bullsh*t, bullsh*t, bullsh*t! Anyway, I guess representing the people for 9 months out of three years isn't a bad record. Better than 9 out of 36.
You're going to call me a naive tit, Mouth, but I'm going to bask in the glow of this one for a minute. I came away from last night's council meeting a little less cynical about the process. A tenant spoke before council last night to oppose the conversions as did three representatives from two community groups (the CACA and the Regina Anti-Poverty Mission). I don't want to diminish their efforts by chalking this up to it being an election year. They spoke well, made their case, and council listened. But yeah, it probably didn't hurt that there was so much media there.
Certainly, I'm sure the tenants' made a big difference. But I'm pretty sure there have been dozens of city council meetings through 2007 and 2008 where tenants just like those ones appeared before committee, spoke, and were summarily dismissed and laughed at behind the scenes.
Go democracy! for sure. It also helped that council already allowed the vacancy rate to dwindle to 0.5% Sure, NOW they step in...
Yes and no. My experience has been that, as far as condo conversions go, tenants haven't really been taking a stand before RPC and council. And the lack of tenant opposition to the conversions has been one of the rationales used to justify letting them happen.
But yes, I think council is underestimating the impact the condo conversions they've approved have had on the vacancy rate. It's even been expressed to me that they consider the condo conversions to be on the fringe of the market so it's impact would be minimal. And maybe with a vacancy rate of 4 or 6 percent that'd be true. But with only 85 vacant apartments in the city (by my count based on the CMHC numbers --- a perusal of the Leader Post classifieds suggests a grand total of 49), all of sudden there is no fringe to the rental market.
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