Calgary councillor wants to fine people for advertising illegal secondary suites

A Calgary councillor is pitching a fine for landlords for advertising to rent out illegal secondary suites.

Secondary suites are allowed and encouraged in the city, provided they meet certain safety standards — like having windows large enough to escape during a fire.

By increasing the number of secondary suites, the city hopes to boost density in Calgary neighbourhoods.

Advertisements for so-called "illegal" suites pepper online rental sites, such as Kijiji and RentFaster.

Andre Chabot, who represents Ward 10 on Calgary's east side, is bringing forward a motion to Calgary council to fine people who place such ads.

He has announced he is running for mayor, and secondary suites and density are expected to be election issues.

Chabot spoke with Calgary Eyeopener host Jennifer Keene on Friday as council prepares to debate the idea early next week.

Q: Why bring in this motion?

A: The challenge that we have is that there are so many appropriately zoned suites in this city that are illegal. They're illegal because they're unsafe. They haven't met the Alberta Building Code or the Alberta Safety Code.

The challenge is, how do we identify those? How do we proactively try to bring them into compliance?

We've done so much outreach to those people to try and get them to convert their illegal suites into legal ones.

This is a mechanism by which we could try and encourage people with illegal suites to bring them into compliance.

It's just another tool.

Q: How would you know if someone places an ad on Kijiji, for example, for their secondary suite, how would you know it's an illegal secondary suite?

A: Because if it's not listed on the City of Calgary's registry, then it's likely not legal.

Q: If someone knows that there's going to be a fine for having that suite, wouldn't that just make them go underground or find other ways to advertise it?

A: If there's a low vacancy rate or a high vacancy rate would make a huge difference on whether or not advertising is essential or not.

If there's a really low vacancy rate, everybody will be looking everywhere they can to try and find a suite. But when a vacancy rate is not low, then you have to advertise to get your suite rented out.

Q: What do you think would be an appropriate fine for that?

A: I'm not looking to try and use this as a punitive measure to make it hard for people with existing suites but something to make them aware of the fact that your suite is illegal.

It's illegal, not because you don't have the appropriate land use. It's illegal because you don't have the appropriate safety measures for your secondary suite.

So I don't know, $50 for first offence? Second offence, however, we would want to have a look at an escalating fine.

This interview has been edited and condensed for length and clarity

With files from the Calgary Eyeopener

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