City of Oshawa Increases Housing Unaffordability with City-wide Rental Property Licensing

City of Oshawa Increases Housing Unaffordability with City-wide Rental Property Licensing

Started
March 11, 2022
Petition to
Tracy Adams and 1 other
Signatures: 1,952Next Goal: 2,500
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Why this petition matters

Started by Christopher Seepe

ISSUE: The City of Oshawa claims that their proposed city-wide Rental Housing Licensing Program "... helps address minimum standards of health, safety, and property maintenance for rental properties in order to protect tenants and ensure compliance with municipal by-laws and provincial legislation."

PREVIOUS ATTEMPT: In April 2022, many stakeholders came forward to speak to City Council about the detrimental effects and deleterious consequences that rental housing licensing would have on housing affordability and availability. Ten expert speakers presented their concerns as well as submitting follow-up documents. Nothing more was heard from the city about rolling out city-wide licensing.

CURRENT ATTEMPT: Around May 01, 2023, City staff submitted another report (SF-23-18) to the city’s Safety and Facilities Services committee. It is a scaled down version of the same report from the previous year. It has not addressed any of the issues of concern previously expressed or those of the subsequent stakeholders the City chose to include – which did not include the long-established Landlords Association of Durham.

The report acknowledged a variety of concerns from the various stakeholders but didn’t address any of those concerns. The previous submissions, views and concerns of all landlords were excluded from the new report including a highly-detailed 13-page submission from the Landlords Association of Durham (although two property management companies were included).

All landlords were represented in a full-page Attachment (#9) that comprised a single sentence “… from a local property owner …” which stated, “I would just like the city to know that I'm not interested in having a rental licence.”

CONSEQUENCES OF LICENSING: A 13-page document was submitted to the City on April 11, 2022 that discussed in great detail the consequences on a licensing program.

A follow-up 8-page document was submitted to the City on May 05, 2023 that expanded further on these consequences.

Both documents are available to anyone who would like a copy. Please contact the petitioner. cseepe@aztechrealty.com.

The following brief summary is wholly inadequate to representing the lengthy list of consequences presented in the two document submissions:

-        Additional fees of any kind add to housing unaffordability and discourage new housing investment and development

-        Durham Region’s seven least-affluent groups are in Oshawa

  • Low-income tenants live exclusively in rental properties
  • Tenants (not landlords) pay property taxes, despite popular misperception
  • Tenants are taxed double that of single family homes
  • For many years, Oshawa has been among the municipalities with the highest property taxes per capita in the GTA

-        Oshawa has not provided any primary data to support their position that a licensing program is warranted:

  • Several viable and “positive-reinforcing alternatives that promote strong property standards compliance were offered but none were acknowledged in either of the City’s reports.
  • Analysis of a City of Ottawa (not Oshawa) report showed that only half of one percent (0.5%) of 100,000 rental properties received more than five complaints (not violations) over 10 years, and concluded, “This indicates that most rental properties in Ottawa are well maintained and managed.”

-        Licensing will permanently obliterate an estimated $125 million or more in Oshawa rental property equity

-        Licensing fees discourage new housing development

-        Housing shortages drive up purchase prices and rent rate

  • GM factory re-opening is a huge contribution to Oshawa coffers
  • Many GM workers live in rental housing

FUNDING THE LICENSING PROGRAM: City staff estimated that the program would cost about $5 million per year plus additional one-time start-up costs. City Council objected strenuously that city property taxes must not be used to fund the program and directed City staff to look into a “full cost recovery” option. In other words, the city’s housing providers should be charged the full cost for a program that solely benefits tenants.

LICENSING FUNDING ANALOGY: Having housing providers pay for policing their properties is like requiring prisoners to pay for the guards and the upkeep of their prison as well as the costs of the judicial system that put the put them there.

CONFLICTS WITH BILL 23: The City’s current report addressed how Ontario’s Bill 23, More Homes Built Faster Act, 2022 will have “minimal impacts” on the licensing program. However, the report did not address how the licensing program will impact Bill 23’s legislated objectives.

The licensing program appears to be in material conflict with several of Bill 23’s objectives, especially:

-       Addressing Missing Middle housing

  • Licensing eliminates any business case for developing missing middle housing.

-       Supporting the Growth and Standardization of Affordable and Rental Housing

  • Any costs like licensing added to housing operations makes housing less affordable, per the next point below.

-       Freezing, Reducing and Exempting fees for Building Attainable, Affordable and Non-Profit Housing

  • From Ontario’s Newsroom backgrounder: “Government charges and fees significantly impact the cost of housing—adding up to $250,000 to the overall cost of building a home … Ontario changed the Planning Act, the Development Charges Act and the Conservation Authorities Act to freeze, reduce and exempt fees, spur the supply of new home construction and help address Ontario’s housing supply crisis.” (https://news.ontario.ca/en/backgrounder/1002525/more-homes-built-faster-act-2022
  • Licensing-related fees and costs of any kind are in conflict with the above objective

-       Streamlining Bureaucratic Processes to Get More Homes Built Faster

  • A licensing program adds significant bureaucratic processes to housing construction and management. A licensing program is in conflict with the above objective for myriad reasons.

-       Creating a New Attainable Housing Program

  • The committee heard testimony last year that any licensing program will discourage housing investors from investing in Oshawa and encourage investors toward more landlord-friendly municipalities that are anxious to attract much-needed housing

-       Calling for Federal Action on GST/HST

  • Adding licensing fees is counterintuitive and counterproductive to Ontario’s efforts to reduce federal taxes and provide housing incentives. Licensing is a compelling housing disincentive.

-       Promoting Fairness to Support Affordable and Other Rental Housing

  • “… Ontario will consult with municipalities on potential approaches to reduce the current property tax burden on multi-residential apartment buildings in the province.
  • Adding licensing fees is counterproductive to reducing the “… tax burden on multi-residential apartment buildings”

CONCLUSION: The City has provided no foundation or facts to substantiate its proposal for a city-wide rental property licensing program. To the contrary, it has received significant facts and studies that show that licensing would detrimental to the best interests of all of the City’s citizens.

The City already receives revenue that is disproportionately high for its size and has more than enough revenue to cover any program of this type.

The licensing program appears to conflict with provincial legislation BILL 23 that was passed to encourage more housing. Licensing discourages housing.

ACTION: Rental housing licensing fees are bad for tenants, housing provider and the City and must be stopped.

PLEASE SIGN THIS PETITION to end this kind of misinformed law-making and tell municipalities that there are far better and higher demand services than licensing that desperately need the taxpayers’ money.

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Signatures: 1,952Next Goal: 2,500
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Decision Makers

  • Tracy Adams
  • Dan Carter