Tenants told to vacate Winnipeg apartment without warning on Friday

Dozens of tenants were given cash and told to immediately vacate a Winnipeg apartment on the weekend after a notice saying the building is shut down was posted at the front entrance. 

A mattress, bags of clothes and furniture were piled near a garbage bin outside Stratford Hall, a three-storey apartment building located on 285 College Ave., on Tuesday. 

People could be seen loading belongings into a moving truck or vehicle while others sat outside holding a few suitcases with nowhere to go. 

"I really don't have anywhere to stay," said Megan Levasseur, who saw signs indicating the building was shutting down on Friday when she came home at 10 p.m. 

She said there were people blocking the entrance that evening to prevent residents from going inside to collect their belongings. 

A spokesperson from the City of Winnipeg said the Winnipeg Fire Paramedic Service attended the site on Friday and found that some fire safety systems were not operational. WFPS ordered that the exits must remain clear and that a "fire watch" be put in place over the weekend, the city said in an email on Tuesday. 

"The WFPS did not order a vacate of the building at any time. It is our understanding that the owner made the decision to vacate the property," the city said.

On Saturday, Levasseur said she returned to her apartment and found her suite had been emptied and her furniture and clothes were thrown in the back lane.

"It's sad. We cried. A lot of us cried yesterday, you know what I mean, just a lot of crying happening," Levasseur said, adding that she feels confused, disappointed and frustrated. 

"Last night I slept out on the street because when I got to the shelter, it was already full, because there's really no room for people in the shelters if you get there too late," she said. 

Levasseur said she was experiencing homelessness before she got help through St. Boniface Street Links, which connected her to housing at Stratford Hall six months ago. 

She said the landlords paid tenants to leave.

Never received a warning

Ivy Palmer said her brother, who's on disability and lived in the building for four years when it was under a different owner, was offered a bit more than a month of rent to vacate the building on Saturday morning. 

She said her brother never received an official eviction notice or a warning that the residence was uninhabitable. 

She spoke with the City of Winnipeg on Saturday, and says she was told to "go down there and advocate for your brother." When she arrived, she saw people, mainly women, holding their belongings on the boulevard and crying. 

"There were like 20 people here just around them, intimidating, like, how do you not take the money? And how do you go up to vulnerable people who don't have anything, who are used to systems disappointing them?" Palmer said. 

"Of course they are going to leave."

Palmer said the landlords got her brother to sign paperwork on Sunday relating to his Employment and Income Assistance rent agreement.

"He was forced to sign it and being told, 'Nobody cares about you, the city is going to do nothing for you, EIA is going to do nothing,'" she said, relating conversations she overheard while on the phone with her brother.

Palmer said she heard her brother being told that if he didn't leave by Monday, police and the fire department would throw him out, and that he would be better off working with the people talking to him.

Palmer was able to cancel the paperwork through EIA, although her brother's belongings were already moved to another location.

A person guarding the apartment door on College Avenue told CBC the owner was inside but did not want to do an interview.

Marion Willis, executive director of St. Boniface Street Links, says they have housed people experiencing homelessness in the building.

"I will be filing a complaint with the Human Rights Commission. I mean, this was the most blatant violation of people's human rights. These folks were treated like they were less than human. It was absolutely horrific," she said. 

Tenants told to vacate Winnipeg apartment without warning

4 months ago

Duration 2:20

Dozens of tenants were ordered to immediately move out of a Winnipeg apartment building the owners said was shutting down, though the city says it did not order a vacate of the building.