Landlord may be breaking tenant act with St. Patrick's Day guest limit

A Waterloo landlord may be breaking the Landlord Tenant Act by limiting the number of guests tenants are allowed to have in The Marq building on King Street this St.Patrick's Day weekend.

The Marq, a student apartment building owned by Centurion, sent an email to its tenants on March 7 said that to reduce fire code issues and potential overcrowding of the building, it would limit one guest per person with a total of 35 guests allowed in the building.

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However, Paris Kiani, a fourth year political science student at Wilfrid Laurier University, believes the new policy — which was put in place specifically for St. Patrick's Day — is illegal.

Kiani Told CBC News she spoke to the City of Waterloo's bylaw office, the fire department and a lawyer, who all told her the new policy goes against Section 22 of the Tenancy Act. 

Kiani said she spoke with the building manager on March 13 regarding what fire and safety and overcrowding issues her building was referring to. 

"In their guideline or fire safety plan there's only allowed to be 240 people in the building at once, which got me thinking, in the past they didn't have a strict guest policy in our building," she told CBC News.

"Last year [for St. Patrick's Day] each tenant was allowed to bring two guests."

She added that she asked to see the building's fire safety plan, but they told her it was "confidential information between them and the property manager."

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The Marq email said it would provide wristbands on a first-come first-serve basis for guests to be allowed in the building.

Guests will not be allowed in the building unless they have a wristband and have photo ID. The tenant must also have ID on hand and accompany the guest able to enter the building.

Unaccompanied guests will not be allowed in the building even if they have a wristband, the email said.

May be breaking Landlord Tenant Act 

Kiani took the issue to the Landlord and Tenant Board and provided CBC News with the email response she received. 

"The Residential Tenancies Act does not prohibit a tenant from having a guest or the number of guests," the tenant board email said.

"A tenant does not need to obtain the landlord's permission or approval to have guests and the landlord does not have the right to interfere with respect to tenants guests. " 

Kiani said in the petition that the new policy to limit guests "violates Section 22 of the Tenancy Act, the Landlord and Tenant Act of Ontario," adding that The Marq is also breaching their own lease by not stating this policy before in the lease.

"I feel as though my rights have been taken away from me," she said. " I feel as though they're doing this as a way to take advantage of us because they probably thought no one would take it this far."

She adds that she spoke with a lawyer, who advised her to create a petition and take it to the building's property manager.

As of noon Thursday, Kiani's petition had 766 of the 1,000 online signature goal.