BRITISH COLUMBIA

DERA, city

Thousands of Downtown Eastsiders
may find themselves on the streets
because of Expo 86 — but not if the
Downtown Eastside Residents’ Associa-
tion (DERA) can help it.

The Vancouver community organiza-
tion, in conjunction with the city’s social
planning department, is backing a plan
that would curtail evictions and freeze
rents in the city’s poorest neighborhood,
home to several thousands of hotel and
lodging house dwellers.

This issue will be debated at a future
city council meeting, at which some hotel
owners have declared their intention to
intervene. :

In a letter’ which accompanies a
lengthy brief based on a survey of popu-
lation, rents and available housing in the
downtown core, DERA organizer Jim
Green noted that more than 2,000 hous-
ing units have been lost in the Down-
town Eastside during the past four years.

“With the approach of Expo the
number of units lost will increase dram-
atically. At the same time we can expect
significant increases in the rental levels in
the area,” Green wrote.

The $200-per month shelter allowance
from the Ministry of Human Resources
barely ‘meets ‘the rents charged: by area
‘landlords. But rents are likely to increase,
Green warned.

The reason, as DERA has warned
repeatedly since plans to create the multi-
million dollar megaproject were an-
nounced, is that hotel and lodging house
owners will be seeking to upgrade their
current “skid road” type buildings to

emasculated though it is under the Social
Credit government’s revamped Residen-
tial Tenancy Act, protects B.C.’s house
and apartment renters to some degree,
hotel and lodging house dwellers have no
such protection.

“The basic fact is that people in the
Downtown, Eastside hotels and rooming

on downtown evictions

seek curbs

bring them under the Residential
Tenancy Act, but the government has
always refused. So we’re saying, ‘give us
at least the minimum protection possi-
ble. 7

What DERA and city social planning
direct Max Beck recommend is a series of
changes to the Vancouver Charter pre-
venting the wholesale: displacement of
the area’s residents.

A survey of hotel operators carried
out by the city this year found few
owners were currently upgrading their
premises to tourist standards. But the -
social planning director’s report goes on
to note, “If they are going to take such
action, they will likely wait until the last
possible moment — January or Febru-
ary, 1986, to do so.

Beck’s report notes that it takes only
four to eight weeks to upgrade the hotels,
enabling operators to make their move at
the last minute. Meanwhile, the city has
no authority to protect dislocated
tenants under the city charter, and needs
enabling legislation from the province to
make the necessary changes to the char-
ter.

His recommendations, based on those
contained in DERA’s brief, call on coun-
cil to:

@ Instruct the director of legal services
to draw up the “enabling legislation” for
Charter amendments allowing the city to
enact a temporary rent freeze and “‘con-
ditional” eviction protection for per-
manent hotel and lodging house residents;

@ Instruct the directors of social plan-
ning and permits and licences to “make

)capitalizeson the touristittade. bis s1ixcbnithe necessaryarrangements to-enforce™ F
§ While current tenantxolegislation;io~

the program-upon enactment of theena-
bling legislation;”

@ Send copies of the report to the
Expo board of directors asking their
support for the measures.

“If this world’s fair is going to be a
success for British Columbia, it should
not be so at the expense of evicted, long-
time tenants,” says Green.

“We cannot allow evictions and dis-
placement to be a legacy of Expo 86.”

TRAC CO-ORDINATOR DAVID LANE...

tenants hit Nacel office with summonses.

Tenants winning deposit
fight, says TRAC head

Tenants are winning small claims court
cases against one of the Lower Mainland’s
biggest landlords, which is “ripping off”
tens of thousands of dollars in unreturned
security deposits, says tenant activist David
Lane.

Lane, co-ordinator of the B.C. Tenants
Rights Action Centre (TRAC), said Nacel
Properties Ltd. uses “threats and intimida-
tion” to enforce an illegal clause in its rental
agreements to rob tenants of their rightful
security deposits. And he blamed the Resi-
dential Tenancy Act for the es
abuse.

Since the Socred abolished the Rentals-
man’s office with the re-written Residential
Tenancy Act last July, throwing tenant-
landlord monetary disputes into the courts,
“exploitative landlords are using the change
in law to rip off tenants by simply refusing
to refund any security deposits, knowing

full well that only a minority of tenants will

fight,” said Lane.

But the ‘centre, run by the B.C. Tenants
Rights Coalition, is working to change that,
said Lane.

Working with two former Nacel tenants
who phoned hundreds of current and
former residents of the corporation’s 60
buildings, the centre packed a Richmond
community hall last month. As a result, the
first 35 summonses to small claims court
were delivered to Nacel head Norm Cressy
June 20.”

The tenants and tenant advocates failed

to find Cressey in his Burnaby office, so they

gave the stack of summonses to Nacel gen- ~

eral manager Ev Haybarger, Lane reported.
“The committee demanded payment in
full for the deposits, which came to more

than $10,000. Haybarger gave no promises '- |

and said they’d review each case on its own
merits.

“After we left Nacel phoned all the .

tenants involved, inviting each one to dis-
cuss the case. The response they got from
everyone was, ‘There’s nothing to discuss,
we'll see you in court,’ ” said Lane.
Nacel’s “sleazy” pratice — and the prac-
tice of other large-scale landlords — is the

inclusion of an illegal clause in tenancy — |

agreements that holds tenants responsible
for cleaning rugs and drapes, regardless of
the condition of the suites when the tenants

move. In fact, tenants cannot be held —

responsible for normal wear and tear to
suites, Lane said.

In two recent small claims ‘courts ©

cases — that of Nacel tenants Vonnie Gill,
Bill Miloglav and Alana Leary, the original
organizers of the Nacel protest — the
tenants have won their cases while Hay-
barger, who represented Nacel in the latter
case, was “thoroughly lectured by the
judge” for the illegal clause, Lane said.

TRAC is amassing more summonses
from Nacel tenants daily, “and unless the
company changes its ways, there'll be a
stack of summonses delivered to them every
month.”

Libby Davies is Harry Rankin's guest
columnist for this week and next week.

In 1975 the United Nations established
1975-85 as the UN Decade for Women,
with “equality, development and peace”
as its themes. This July in Nairobi, Kenya,
the official UN conference will review and
appraise the achievements of the UN
decade for women. In addition, women
from around the world will gather at a
non-governmental organization (NGO)
forum at the same time and place to dis-
cuss the progress women have made and
obtacles still to be overcome.

The Congress of Canadian Women
(CCW) B.C. Chapter has selected me as its
delegate to Forum 85. I would like to tell
you something about the written submis-
sions made by the CCW to the forum.
This week I'll discuss the meaning of
equality for Canadian women.

Around the world, women are engaged
in the struggle for equality. On Apr. 17,
1982, the Canadian Charter of Rights and
Freedoms was passed by Parliament. Our
Charter of Rights and Freedoms has
many important implications for all Can-
adians, but Section 15, guaranteeing equal
rights, was not enacted at that time and
was put instead under a three year mora-
torium.

The fact that Section 15 was there in our
Charter of Rights at all was the result of
intense lobbying by many women’s
groups, including the CCW. On April 17
this year, Section 15 came into full force. It
states:

“Every individual is equal before ad
under the law and has the right to the
equal protection and equal benefit of the
law without discrimination and, in partic-

ular, without discrimination based on
race, national or ethnic origin, color, reli-
gion, sex, age or mental or physical disabil-
ity.”

Canadian women now have the job of
putting that principle of equality into
effect.

In 1982, the average earnings of Cana-
dian women employed full-time were just
64 per cent of those of full-time male
employees. Only 25 per cent of all paid
female employees were in trade unions,

Nairobi meet: fight is on for women’s equality

compared to 37 per.cent males.
Canadian families headed by women

' average half the income of families with

male heads. Sixty per cent of single elderly
women live below the poverty line.
‘These facts represent the consequences
of inequality in Canada.
The Charter of Rights and Freedoms
must be tested in the courts; its provisions
must be confirmed and extended. Provin-

Libby
Davies

cial and municipal laws must be amended
to conform to the Charter.

The CCW believes that the Charter
must be utilized along with other measures
to attain those goals (without which equal-
ity for Canadian women cannot be gua-
ranteed):

@ Universal access to quality, publicly
funded, comprehensive childcare;

® Removal of any legal barriers to
unionization, including efforts to organize
the unemployed into trade unions;

- provincial governments has been predic-

@ Full employment with no loss in pay
or benefits;

© Legislation at all levels to guarantee
equal pay for work of equal value;

© Adequate, fully paid maternity leave,
the right to choose birth or abortion,
comprehensive universal health care;

© Free quality and accessible education
at all levels;

@ Wider powers for human rights
commissions to enforce Section 15 and
other laws concerning equality;

@ Affirmative action programs to begin
the process of ensuring equal opportuni-
ties.

' The response of the federal and some

table; massive “restraint” programs,
aimed at working people and the poor,
that have slashed social programs and
benfits, and the erosion of universal acces-
sibility to quality health care, education
programs, pension benefits and women’s
support programs, despite the strong
efforts of women and people’s organiza-
tions to resist these cutbacks.

Women in Canada have a tough fight
to ensure that “legal” equality translates
into concrete action that will measurably
and qualitatively improve the status of
women in Canada.

2 e PACIFIC TRIBUNE, JUNE 26, 1985