Halifax, NS (October 27, 2022) – On October 27, 2022, tenant Stacey Gomez, her lawyer Mitch Broughton and Lisa Lachance (MLA Halifax Citadel-Sable Island) appeared in a press conference at the office of CIR Law Inc in Halifax. They spoke against the move by landlord Marcus Ranjbar (4364812 Nova Scotia Limited) to immediately terminate Ms. Gomez’ tenancy, which they say doesn’t follow the rules.
On October 25, 2022, Ms.Gomez was served by the landlord with a Form F Notice to Quit – Additional Circumstances. The landlord is claiming that this terminates Ms. Gomez’ tenancy effective immediately and that he will remove her remaining personal property, if she does not do so herself by October 28, 2022.
This follows an “Order to vacate unsafe property” issued to the landlord by Halifax Regional Municipality (HRM) officials for his Church St. building, which is at the centre of a renoviction battle with Ms. Gomez. The Order reads: “the Property is deemed to be unsafe due to excessive mold in the air posing a health risk to residents occupying the space.”
Ms. Gomez complied with the HRM Order, leaving her home temporarily while mould abatement occurs. However, she says that for close to one year, the landlord remained silent about a possible mould issue and failed to take actions to fix or control the problem.
“Imagine leaving your home temporarily, for example, going on a vacation and your landlord unilaterally deciding to lock you out, permanently, from where you have lived for years. I left temporarily while mould abatement occurs, but now the landlord is saying that my tenancy is over, permanently. So far, municipal officials haven’t given an indication of how long the repairs will take. It could be days, or if could be more. At this point, we simply don’t know,” said Ms. Gomez.
She added: “I am open to collaborating with the landlord to address this matter, for example, moving items to another space in the apartment while work is happening in a specific area, but this hasn’t been raised as an option.”
“Ms. Gomez does not accept that her tenancy is terminated. A landlord cannot unilaterally terminate a tenancy. A tenancy can only be terminated through the Residential Tenancies Board with a Termination Order. A Landlord cannot simply file a Form F and then a few days later, remove a tenant’s possessions from their unit, effectively evicting them. If this were the case, tenants would have next to no protection in this Province.
Ms. Gomez is of the position that her landlord could have addressed the issues outlined in their own reports, and they could have followed the HRM order to remedy the mold issue, and the water ingress, without evicting her. They chose not to do so,” said Mr. Broughton, Ms. Gomez’ lawyer.
The Nova Scotia government website reads: “By law, you must give the tenant Form F at least …7 days before the date you want the tenant to move out for any reason other than failure to pay rent and breach of statutory conditions.” It is further stated: “If your tenant doesn’t leave, you can file for a hearing using Form J for an eviction order.”
“The government needs to act now. We hear a lot about balancing the rights and responsibilities of Tenants and landlords and What we really want to see in the act and in the enforcement is respect for what people are going through with their homes and the places they live and to see that in fact the system can work to protect people in these situations,” said MLA Lisa Lechance.
Ms. Gomez is calling on MLA Colton LeBlanc, Nova Scotia’s minister responsible for the Residential Tenancies Act, to ensure that landlord Ranjbar follows the rules.
