Landlords and renovations

[lissafay]

For the past few days, I've been reading articles about a building on Langside Street here in Winnipeg that was damaged by fire back at the end of September, thanks to a teenaged arsonist.  The property management company has kept the building open since the fire, continuing to collect rent from its tenants, and has yet to repair the fire damage

Comments

[fireglade]

i just *love* how "revitalization" means pretty up the building
and charge more, so low-income residents have to leave
and find a new "poor area" to live.
it makes me sick.

[lissafay]

For me, the worst part about what the landlord says is that he could have put the rent up $300, but instead he's only putting it up $75 out of concern for his tenants. Because people on welfare, of course, get $75 more for rent when that happens (insert sarcastic tone here). He's lying to himself and to everyone else if he really thinks that's being helpful, or that anyone believes he gives a shit about the tenants.

[lissafay]

Eeek, that's awful! It would be interesting to canvas a large number of buildings around the West Broadway and Downtown areas to see how many of their owners are doing some "revitalization", and how many people are being displaced by the exhorbitant rent increases. Where the heck are all the people in your building going to go that can't afford to stay there? Isn't the vacancy rate in Winnipeg something less than 1% these days, with many apartments going so high in price that lower income people can't afford them? I wonder how busy they are at the shelters around town...