Proposal to licence Toronto rooming houses will face stiff opposition
Staff report proposes city-wide regulating and licensing of rooming houses. The report is on next week’s executive committee agenda

TheStar.com
Oct. 19, 2016
Betsy Powell

City staff is proposing a zoning and licensing regime for rooming houses across Toronto, a contentious move certain to face stiff opposition in the suburbs where many operate illegally.

“A licensing by-law provides the city with additional tools to protect the health and safety of tenants in multi-tenant houses, as well as mitigate the impact on the surrounding community,” says a new report from the city’s planning and licensing divisions.

“Current regulations for multi-tenant houses are a patch work of by-laws that were not updated after amalgamation and do not adequately address the need for this type of housing,” the report says.

Rooming houses are currently licensed and regulated in Etobicoke and within the former city of Toronto, but are prohibited in Scarborough and North York. In York, they can operate without a licence.

Public consultations showed the fiercest opposition comes from Scarborough, where the explosion of illegal rooming houses has been a festering issue for years.

“It’s a litany of complaints, they don’t want these houses regulated, they want them to be abolished,” said Norm Kelly, (Ward 40, Scarborough-Agincourt.)

Kelly said anything that adds a regulatory burden and increases the costs for many rooming house operators will “work against a workable licensing system.”

“It wouldn’t surprise me in doing this that in the end you’re going to be getting more illegal (rooming houses) rather than under the proposed guidelines.”

Councillor Jim Karygiannis (Ward 39, Scarborough-Agincourt), said he favors regulation to “guarantee (an) absolute safe environment for the tenants.”

But unless city inspectors can access properties and impose strict penalties, many operators will go underground.

“Unless you show me the teeth to the bylaw…but for every legal rooming house in my area you’re going to have ten illegal rooming houses.”

Councillor Shelley Carroll (Don Valley East, Ward 33) represents an area south of Seneca College, where rooming houses began proliferating years ago after the province ended Grade 13. That created the so-called double cohort that turned out “lots of students and no housing.”

While some residents would like to see rooming houses banned outright, that would throw an untold number of tenants onto the street, she said.

If implemented correctly, a licensing program will help ensure rooming houses are inspected and give the city the power to crackdown on properties linked to overcrowding, excessive noise and garbage, Carroll said.

Geordie Dent, executive director of the Federation of Metro Tenants’Associations, said the harmonization of the rooming house bylaws is long overdo.

“If you’ve got to license a hot dog stand or a cab in the city of Toronto you should have to license a place where a majority of people spend their day,” Dent said.

“There is a major affordable housing issue in the city. We’re seeing it in a variety of different reports about escalating rents, low vacancy rates, and anything that can help people get into stable housing is best for the city…so rooming houses can be a good component of that.”

Staff is asking executive committee, at next week’s meeting, to recommend that public consultations be held on the proposed regulatory and licensing strategy and its potential impact and report back next year.