Local landlords take issue with proposed rental registration bylaw

“It’s very much disheartening to read it and then being almost told… that I would be a danger to public health and safety because I’m the landlord,” he added.

The purpose of the proposed bylaw is to give the city a clearer picture of the current rental landscape and inventory in North Battleford. It was initiated in response to several discussions about community safety, standards, and housing, along with many complaints from the public and general community in relation to the substandard states of some residential properties. The city said without knowing how many rental properties there are, or who to contact, and without having the legislative tools required to inspect, the city can’t enforce many of the existing bylaws that regulate provisions for the purposes of safety inside a rental property.

“Where hazardous or unsafe conditions are evident within a residential rental property, the proposed bylaw would permit authorized personnel to arrange an inspection of the property from either a fire safety and/or building inspection perspective to ensure the health, wellbeing, and safety of a property’s tenants. This opportunity is currently non-existent within legislation,” read a press release about the topic issued by the city in July – prior to public consultations that took place.

Landlords of multi-unit dwellings with more than four units would be exempt under the proposed bylaw since they are covered by separate legislation.

Kostiuk attended some of the public consultations that took place over the summer, although he said one meeting resembled more of a debate than a consultation.

“It almost felt as though it was an ‘us and them.’ It’s like, ‘this is what we want to do as the city, but you know what, we’re going to make everybody do this,’” Kostiuk said.

He’d like to see more discussion.

“Without the terms and conditions being finalized in this bylaw – proposed bylaw – it leaves us wondering OK, so, we get into this contractual agreement, we register, we sign up, but at any point and time, there’s something that gets changed,” he said, adding there was little clarity.

“This bylaw right now, I am fearful that it will thwart investment in our community for anybody wanting to do this.”

The city argues the RRPR bylaw is proactive in that it would allow inspections before complaints are received, and in North Battleford’s case, before a serious injury or fatality has occurred. In 2024, the North Battleford Fire Department responded to nine residential structure fires. A report from the city showed six of the fires were in rental properties and each of the six properties had ‘internal deficiencies in contravention of legislated and bylaw mandated minimum standards.’

During a question period, Coun. Thomas (Bill) Ironstand noted landlords “have a responsibility to make that a rental property is livable and habitable so that people have a safe, warm home.”

“Not that they’re worried that it’s going to burn down in the middle of the night, or they don’t have water or sewer or anything like that,” he said.

“We have to make this bylaw that all of the landlords are under the blanket,” he said, noting that they can’t target some but not others.

The Saskatchewan Landlord Association’s chief executive officer spoke at the council meeting. Cameron Choquette said the organization is ‘somewhat supportive’ of the proposed bylaw.

“I can understand the benefits of data collection, but I can’t seem to understand why the city doesn’t have the contact information for rental housing providers who pay millions of dollars in taxes in utilities every year.”

Choquette recommended that the city only require the current contact information and civic address to collect data for communication purposes, amend the current maintenance bylaw to give the legislative framework to conduct proactive inspections, establish a designated email address for tenants to submit complaints, and use targeted enforcement.

“You can continue to target a property that continues to not comply. Targeted enforcement of bad apples is where resources should be dedicated.”

He suggested the recommendations the SLA had were more nuanced, cost effective and will allow the city to achieve its goals while not creating additional burdens on the rental housing industry ‘at a time when we want to welcome investment, not scare it away.’

At one point during Monday’s meeting, order needed to be called when the discussion over the proposed bylaw became too heated. Ultimately, council chose to take more time to hear from stakeholders before making any decisions on the bylaw.

“I think we need to keep researching the approach,” said Mayor David Gillan.

“We don’t want to be targeting law-abiding landlords; we want to be targeting those I would say are…the minority in our community.”

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julia.lovettsquires@pattisonmedia.com

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by Julia Lovett-Squires

Local landlords take issue with proposed rental registration bylaw

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