Renters rally in Vancouver, angry over approval of 4.5% maximum rent hike
Posted September 13, 2018 6:09 am.
Last Updated September 13, 2018 10:06 pm.
This article is more than 5 years old.
VANCOUVER (NEWS 1130) – Angry renters gathered for a protest in downtown Vancouver today, demonstrating against the province’s approval of a 4.5 per cent increase next year.
Organizers call the coming rent hike a crisis in an already unaffordable city.
Before the rally, the Vancouver Tenants Union‘s (VTU) members asked anyone upset with how much landlords will be able to bump up rent next year to gather with them outside the Landlord BC office downtown at noon.
“We hope that they’ll join us in calling on the government to cancel the rent hike [approval],” says Stephanie Langford with the VTU.
“We hope to hear from brave tenants about the struggle to find and keep affordable housing in Vancouver.”
RELATED: B.C. to see highest maximum allowable rent increase since 2004
Langford says members met last weekend and “it was standing room only.”
“Tenants flooded to our meeting — afraid, angry and, in some cases, in tears over the provincial government’s announcement to [allow landlords to] increase rents by 4.5 per cent.”
Next year’s maximum allowable rent hike will be the highest in 15 years.
The group is trying to send a message to the provincial government and Landlord BC that the cost of housing in the region is a crisis, and there’s still time to roll back next year’s hike.
RELATED: Rent hikes are necessary to cover increased costs, says Landlord BC
“This rent increase is not inevitable,” Langford argues. “We believe that if tenants rise up and pressure our government to do the right thing, there’s still time for them to cancel [it] and stand on the side of tenants.”
“We thought the provincial government was more sympathetic to renters,” she adds.
Her group is calling for a rent freeze.
After all the outcry, the Rental Housing Task Force — struck in April by the provincial government — has said it is reviewing the formula it uses for the maximum allowable rent increase.
– With files from John Ackermann
