November 1st, 2012

Building owner’s message urges support for Uteck

Canada has a history of student groups, labour organizations, celebrities and newspapers endorsing political candidates.

Now, a company that owns apartment buildings in the Halifax region is encouraging its tenants to vote for a particular council candidate in a five-person race, and that has an opponent seeing red.

Gerry Walsh said Thursday that renters in buildings owned by Paramount Management have recently received an email message urging them to vote for Sue Uteck in the new Peninsula South-Downtown district.

Aside from Walsh and Uteck, Mike MacDonell, Waye Mason and Dawg Father PHD are seeking to represent the Halifax constituency.

Voting day is Saturday.

Walsh said the property owner’s message to tenants is inappropriate at best and constitutes interference at worst.

“We support Sue, and think you should too,” part of the email correspondence says.

An apartment building owner has a certain amount of authority over renters, Walsh said, and that power structure is why he feels this case is troubling.

“I see quite a big distinction between the unions or student groups or (others) endorsing” a candidate, Walsh told The Chronicle Herald. “Because that relationship is more peer-to-peer than the landlord-tenant example here.” Walsh said Paramount Management is owned by developer Louis Lawen, a contributor to Uteck’s last campaign in 2008.

Uteck confirmed Lawen “did contribute to my campaign. That is a matter of public record.”

As for the message to renters, “I was not aware that (Paramount) was going to write to its tenants about supporting me,” she said. “It was their own initiative.”

Meanwhile, in a release Thursday, the Nova Scotia Federation of Labour said it is “closely watching municipal and school board elections throughout the province this week.”

It said the federation “is pleased to endorse and support pro-worker candidates across the Halifax Regional Municipality.”

The umbrella trade union organization “supports progressive, pro-worker candidates who will make sure issues like good jobs, affordable housing and quality public services like libraries and recreation programs are front and centre.”

http://thechronicleherald.ca/municipal2012/150862-election-email-to-tenants-rapped#.UIFfXUYihVg.twitter

http://ontariolandlords.org/blog/housing-minister-wynne-on-the-rent-increase-guideline/

http://albertalandlords.ca/2012/10/11/landlords-fire-prevention-week-time-to-make-your-secondary-suites-legal/