Being the leading advocacy group for small landlords in Ontario, on Friday May 3rd, 2024 SOLO’s chairman and another board member constituent met the the honourable Rudy Cuzzetto, the Progressive Conservative member of Provincial Parliament at his office in Mississauga – Lakeshore.
The main goal was to brief the elected representative on the issues related to the housing crisis – which Ontario Small Landlords can help alleviate.
Boubah (left on the picture) and Vera (right), introduced Small Ownership Landlords Ontario Inc. (SOLO) – as a federally registered and a provincial official lobby. A non-profit organization dedicated to advocate Ontario’s small scale housing provider’s concerns.
The SOLO representatives explained that the 8,000 plus registered small landlords – including hundreds in the Mississauga Lakeshore riding – and across Ontario are experiencing serious issues with the current state of our rental resolution mechanism. Both good landlords and good tenants are being impacted by the delays at the Landlord and Tenant Board’s (LTB) proceedings; non-payment of rent being the number one applications from landlords. SOLO’s position is those issues can be adjudicated differently and proposed a workable solution to the Ministry of Housing and Municipal Affairs as well as the Premier office. The Ontario rental supply is dwindling as many small landlords – main providers of affordable housing – do not trust to have the government support and are leaving the rental market in Ontario.
Cuzzetto listened carefully and shared his concern about the housing crisis affecting Ontarians particularly in the Mississauga Lakeshore. He reminded SOLO that the PC government has allocated funds to the LTB to clear the backlog and hire more adjudicators and was under the impression that the delays are decreasing. SOLO confirmed that indeed there is a slight decrease compared to post-pandemic, but the current situation is still untenable for “mom and pop” landlords that are lacking big corporation resources. MPP Cuzzetto agreed that indeed small landlords are being disproportionately impacted by any delay as being financially vulnerable.
The conversation was cordial and SOLO landlords are appreciative for the elected representative to listen to small landlord’s concerns and his encouragement for SOLO. He says he intends to convey the proposals to the appropriate government ministry and offices namely the Attorney General for “professional tenants” conducting rental fraud and the Ministry of Municipal Affairs and Housing overseeing the RTA / LTB.
MPP Cuzzetto is member of the Standing Committee on the Interior empowered to “study and report on all matters relating to the mandate, management, organization or operation of the ministries and offices which are assigned to it as well as the agencies, boards and commissions reporting to such ministries and offices” according to the Ontario Parliament website. He welcomed SOLO as his duty to listen and report his constituency’s concerns and accepted SOLO’s offer to assist local small landlord constituents with issues and needing non professional help from its volunteers.
