By: Sam Hillen | March 3 2021 |
Student housing is expensive. It’s not because the houses are nice because they really aren’t. No, instead student housing is expensive because it can be. Students can take out loans to pay off over their lifetimes, students usually don’t fight lessors when they try to exploit them, and students are happier overall with the convenience that student housing offers. But most of all student housing is expensive because it’s housing, and housing is expensive. And never has this question been more pertinent than during a global pandemic where staying home can be life or death for high risk individuals.
355,000 jobs were lost in Ontario last year due to the COVID-19 pandemic. Without an income tenants are forced to choose between food and amenities or rent and bills. And although Doug Ford has been renewing eviction protections for tenants in areas with a stay-at-home order in effect regions without this order, like Kingston, aren’t protected. The federal government has also done little to stop the looming mortgage and rent crisis; without aid, thousands face eviction and mortgage foreclosure. One interesting practice being adopted in Toronto to protect tenants from eviction is unionization.
It works like workplace unions as a collective bargaining organization for the tenants to dispute their eviction hearings with the Landlord and Tenant Board (LTB). Tenants can assemble and go to the board meetings together to act as a body to defend against individual evictions. The Toronto ‘Greenwood Park Tenants Union’ argues primarily against increases in monthly rent and uses its influence to force landlords to hear the requests for rent relief. Prior to the union, Ranee Management, the company that owns 108 Greenwood Park Court, tenants were pressured constantly to continue their rent payments through the pandemic continuing to take its toll on their bank accounts. This agitation culminated in a protest around Toronto Mayor John Tory’s home last summer, and from there Greenwood’s movement was adopted by several other apartment buildings around Toronto.
This unionization practice is especially pertinent to the average Ontarian struggling to pay rent as, with the introduction of Bill 184, tenants have been isolated like never before. The bill essentially gives the power to the landlords to make deals with tenants for payment plans during the pandemic and other agreements that, if not followed and paid on time, can result in eviction without ever going to the LTB. It’s like signing a bad phone contract that ends up charging you so much it literally bankrupts you and makes you homeless. Without proper legal training many tenants sign bad payment deals or agreements with no legal recourse. The isolation of each individual tenant against the property owning company only further pressures tenants into unwise decisions. Having a union represent the collective tenant body counters not only the heavy legalease in the payment documents but also gives much more power to the word of the tenants as individuals can no longer be isolated and exploited.
As someone going to university next year, having an organization that will fight for my rights as a tenant or clarify legal documents and ensure that I don’t sign bad deals sounds like an excellent concept. These organizations could potentially limit rents, organize ‘rent strikes,’ and be a collective bargaining chip not only in student housing industries but also in all housing. At the least I think it’s a worthwhile idea that requires further investigation and study on the effects it could have on the housing market.
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