Municipal Hall

December 8, 2009 / 6:00 PM

At the Regular Council Meeting on Tuesday, December 8, 2009 Mayor Ernie Daykin provided Council and citizens with an update on the solid progress the District is making to improve the safety of the homes at the Northumberland Court complex. Northumberland Court is a twenty unit strata owned property on Fraser Street in downtown Maple Ridge.

Following a thorough inspection of all but one of the units by District staff in the Spring of this year, the owners of the units were issued with remedial orders to repair the units in order to bring them to a standard where they would be safe to live in. Orders were also issued to the strata to remediate some aspects of the common property that were deemed unsafe. The one unit that did not get inspected was vacated soon thereafter and has been secured since then.

In July, 2009 the District received permission from the courts to demolish one "pod" of four units owned by Mr. Athwal that had been vacant following a fire a number of years ago. The costs of the demolition have been charged to all of the owners of Northumberland Court.

By the end of July, the owners of five of the units complied with the District's orders. The single owner of the remaining ten units, Mr. Jack Athwal, did not comply.

In September, Council reaffirmed the remedial orders on the ten units. The District also notified Mr. Athwal that in order to safely perform the repair works the units needed to be vacated. The cost of any repairs will be charged to Mr. Athwal. Five of those units are now vacant and the District has been advised that four more units will be vacant by December 11^th. The remaining unit is involved in a tenancy arbitration that is expected to be heard in the near future.

The works on the common property were started but have stalled.

Mayor Daykin noted that "thanks to the resolve of Council and the tenacity of our staff, very soon, there will be no one living in intolerable conditions in this complex." "The pace of change is slower than all of us would like, but over the course of the past year the burned-out pod has been demolished, the minority owners have made repairs to their units and by the end of this week we anticipate that all but one of the Athwal's units will be vacant." "I want to thank the community's Outreach workers who have been assisting those who occupied the units to find alternate accommodation."