Ontario is taking steps to provide further support to tenants in the province by increasing the number of adjudicators and staff at the Landlord and Tenant Board (LTB), with the aim of reducing wait times and addressing the high volume of cases. The government has announced a $6.5 million investment to appoint 40 additional adjudicators and hire five new staff members to improve service and reduce the number of active applications. The province is also working on strengthening various tenant protections. The LTB handles disputes between landlords and tenants and oversees eviction applications filed by non-profit housing co-operatives under the Residential Tenancies Act, 2006. The board has faced criticism for its delayed resolutions, with complainants reporting wait times of up to seven to eight months, and even longer in some cases.
The recent investment announced in Ontario has more than doubled the number of full-time adjudicators at the LTB, which is expected to reduce the caseload for existing staff and potentially lead to faster dispute resolutions. “Residents and rental housing providers deserve fast results, and government bureaucracy should not stand in the way,” commented Attorney General Doug Downey. The province is also considering various measures to make life easier for tenants, including enhancing their rights to install air conditioning in their units. Additionally, the government is proposing to strengthen protections against evictions related to renovations, demolitions, conversions, as well as those for landlord’s own use.
Under proposed changes in Ontario, landlords would be required to provide a report from a qualified person stating that a unit must be vacant for renovations to take place, update the tenant in writing on the status of the renovation, and give them a 60-day grace period to move back in once renovations are complete, if evicting a tenant to renovate a unit. If the landlord does not allow the tenant to move back in at the same rent, the tenant would have up to two years after moving out or six months after renovations are complete (whichever is longer) to apply to the LTB for a remedy.
In cases where a tenant is in arrears of rent, they may enter into a repayment agreement with their landlord to pay what is owed and avoid eviction. Additionally, the government is consulting on changes to create a more balanced framework governing municipal rental replacement by-laws, such as requiring replacement units to have the same core features as the original units, giving existing tenants the right to move into the new unit while paying the same rent.
The province is also proposing to increase the maximum fines for offences under the Residential Tenancies Act, including bad faith renovictions, with fines for individuals potentially rising to $100,000 and fines for corporations potentially doubling to $500,000.
