Alberta Justice Minister criticized for “unfair” rental laws

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Members of a tenants’ rights group expressed their displeasure over the lack of rent control in Alberta on Wednesday by demonstrating outside Justice Minister Micky Amery’s constituency office in northeast Calgary.

About 10 members of Alberta ACORN (The Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now organized the small rally in front of Amery’s Calgary-Cross constituency office in a Marlborough shopping center and simultaneously delivered a letter of demand to the MP’s office calling on the province to introduce rent control and landlord licensing.

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“Our demands are quite simple: We believe that landlords in particular need a cap on rent increases,” said Maggy Wlodarczyk, chair of ACORN’s Calgary branch.

“For some people, rent has increased by hundreds or even thousands of dollars, which is completely out of proportion to the cost of inflation or labor costs.”

The rally comes amid an ongoing housing crisis in Calgary. Last September, the city’s annual housing assessment found that in 2021, one in five Calgary households struggled to afford their housing, which is about 84,600 households – a number that the city believes will almost certainly be even higher three years later.

The dismal results of that assessment led city council to adopt a new housing strategy less than two weeks later, containing dozens of measures to curb rising housing costs in Calgary.

But laws limiting rent increases are a provincial responsibility, which is why ACORN is targeting various UCP MPs this month during a series of solidarity rallies across Alberta, according to Wlodarczyk.

“We’ve had quite a few members whose rent has been raised so high that they couldn’t afford it because they’re either on disability or retired,” Wlodarczyk said. “Their cost of living has just been raised to an exorbitant amount. Some of them have become homeless.”

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A report from rental listing website Rentals.ca last month found that the average price for a one-bedroom apartment in Calgary was $1,751 per month, while a two-bedroom suite averaged $2,157 per month.

While other large cities in provinces with rent controls still have higher rents than Calgary, — like Vancouver and Toronto — At Wednesday’s rally, ACORN members said rent control would help slow the rise in rents in Calgary.

“We hope to get rent control passed before we get to the point where Vancouver, Toronto and similar cities are,” Wlodarczyk said. “Sometimes when these things get passed, it’s too little, too late. So we’re hoping this can happen sooner rather than later.”

Canada Mortgage and Housing Corp.’s 2024 Rent Outlook, released in April, projects that average rents in Calgary will converge on the current average rent in Toronto by 2025 due to factors such as a rapidly growing population and a shortage of housing.

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Another ACORN member striking on Wednesday was Abi Martin, who said they were happy that the rent for their high-rise apartment in the Beltline had only increased by 7 percent a year.

But Martin (who uses the pronouns “they”) said some of her friends are not so lucky, having recently received a rent increase from their landlord of between $500 and $1,000 a month.

“There are countless stories coming to light from people in my community,” Martin said, adding that they would like the province to take some responsibility for rising housing costs.

“We need all the protection we can get right now. Who can afford a $1,000 raise?”

In response to a request for comment from Postmedia, Jason Nixon, minister of seniors, community and social services, said the Alberta government will not go down the “disastrous path” of rent control because it would not work and would only leave more Albertans homeless.

Nixon said the province is “focused squarely” on creating more affordable and more affordable housing in response to a critical supply shortage.

He added that Alberta leads the country by having the fewest regulations and fastest approval times for housing construction. He noted that Alberta had its busiest month on record for housing starts in July, with more than 4,350 new homes built. — including a 52 percent increase in construction activity in Calgary compared to July 2023.

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