UPDATE (July 20, 2017): After completing an inspection of the Balmoral Hotel on July 14, the City’s chief building official has deemed the building to be repaired to their satisfaction. A complete review is being done by the Sahota family’s hired contractor to assess the work that needs to be done. Given the deteriorated conditions of the building, the City anticipates a large amount of work will be necessary to return this building to the SRO stock.
The City of Vancouver has conducted an inspection of a Downtown Eastside Single Room Occupancy (SRO) hotel that was evacuated over “disgusting” conditions.
It remains unclear whether the Balmoral Hotel has met city standards and passed inspection.
Nearly 150 tenants were forced to leave the notorious building in early June, after the city deemed residents were in “imminent danger” and the building was at risk of collapse due to serious water damage.
The city ordered the building’s owners, the Sahota family, to begin making repairs immediately.
That included an order for $1 million in structural repairs to the first floor bar and building envelope, and the requirement the owners hire professional engineers to conduct a full assessment of the building.
It gave the owners until July 14 to complete the work, and said if it was not done city crews would do it and bill the owners.
The city said it has been in regular contact with a professional contractor the owners hired to work on the building and that “they are progressing as expected.”
However it said the inspection report has not been completed yet, and the city won’t be able to provide an update until Monday.
WATCH: Protest block party held outside Balmoral Hotel on the eve of evacuation deadline
Poor conditions in the Balmoral have been a focus of housing advocates for years, who have complained about broken elevators, rats, and mould among other issues.
The family owns a number of SROs in the area that have been criticized for conditions, including the Regent and the Astoria.
Housing activist Wendy Pedersen said she’s skeptical the Sahotas will have followed through with work to genuinely improve conditions in the building.
She said the city should just step in and do the work itself.
Pedersen said she’s also concerned that now that the inspection is done public attention will drift away from the squalid conditions DTES residents have been living in.
“Then everybody goes back to normal which is we don’t have a very strong inspections department, they’re not using the tools that they’ve got on hand to penalize landlords.”
Since November alone, the city has referred 150 issues at the Balmoral to prosecution.
But in a statement at the time of the evacuation, Mayor Gregor Robertson acknowledged legal efforts against landlords often fall flat.
“The slumlords who have run these buildings down, we have been in courts, we have been pursuing legal avenues for years now to crack down on slumlords, and the city doesn’t have effective enough tools to turn the situation around by ourselves.”
No word yet on when the city will announce the results of Friday’s inspection.
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