Evicted Summerside woman plans to live in camper with her 2 children

A P.E.I. mother of two who will be homeless as of Friday is blaming a lack of support and resources in the Summerside area — and the skyrocketing cost of rental housing.

Ashley Bridges was told she had to vacate her house because her landlord needed it for a relative. So far, she has had no luck in her hunt for another affordable place to live in Summerside.

Bridges has been working full-time hours at a local dairy bar, but the job is seasonal. She is receiving income support to make ends meet.

Now she said she and her two children will have to live in a camper for the summer.

Having no wish to stay at a shelter with her children, she has tried calling low-income housing organizations for help. With no luck there, Bridges said she feels like she's been thrown to the wolves.

"It's very nerve-wracking. I don't know if I'm going to be able to put food on the table for my kids. I don't know if I'm going to be able to live on a day-to-day basis," she said. 

"Buying them clothes right now is very… I can't because I don't have the money to do it. It's very stressful, trying to keep them going and trying to keep them happy and trying to keep us all happy as a family."

Bridges paid $1,100 per month for rent at her current residence, but can't find anything remotely close to that price range, she said.

"Now it's $2,000 or $3,000 to live in a place and that's without heat and lights," she said.

Bridges did attempt to appeal her eviction notice under the Residential Tenancy Act, but said she missed a teleconference with the Island Regulatory and Appeals Commission because she was dealing with the death of someone close to her. 

IRAC told CBC News in an email this week that an appeal is automatically dismissed if someone doesn't show up in person on a specified date or dial into the commission's scheduled teleconference hearing. 

"If given advance notice that a party cannot attend a scheduled hearing (i.e., illness, appointment, or tragedy), the Rental Office will accommodate and will adjourn the matter," the email said. Otherwise, it said: "The appellant has the responsibility to appear at their own appeal."

Displaced into an unfriendly market

Cory Pater is a member of the P.E.I. Fight For Affordable Housing. He said situations like the one Bridges finds herself in are referred to as "no-fault evictions," where tenants are shown the door despite having done nothing wrong.

"It's displacing people into a market that's really not friendly to be in," he said. "It's hard to find a place, let alone a place that's within your means."

Pater said income support on the Island is not enough to live on, citing records the organization has been keeping dating back to 2003.  

He said the amounts paid to Islanders needing help should be boosted as the housing market evolves.

"That's definitely something that needs to be adjusted — and be adjusted frequently to keep up with the costs," he said.

Pater also thinks measures must be taken to protect tenants from landlords evicting them to let their own relatives move in.

We'd like to see the landlord actually have the responsibility put on them to find new housing for the person.— Corey Pater

"We really need to beef up tenant protections to meet the extraordinary circumstances that we're in with the housing market," he said.

"We'd like to see the landlord actually have the responsibility put on them to find new housing for the person, to support them in getting a new home that is on-par with their previous accommodations."

The P.E.I. Fight for Affordable Housing would eventually like the province to eliminate all avenues of evicting people for no-fault reasons, Pater said.

No 'magic supply of housing'

Dan Kutcher, the mayor of Summerside, said he wishes there was a quick solution to the rental crisis on the Island.

"I don't have a magic supply of housing here. Unfortunately, it's just trying to make sure she gets in the right contact with the right people who can provide those supports," he said of Bridges.

"We put in place a task force on attainable housing, and that group has now had a number of meetings to bring forward recommendations for council."

CBC News requested interviews with the provincial minister of housing and the minister of social development multiple times. There was no response to those requests.