Hotel residents who fear retribution by a “thug” landlord addressed Vancouver council Thursday under an unprecedented cloak of anonymity.
Their stories of squalor, fraud and bullying by George Wolsey and Doug Robinson at the Wonder Rooms and Palace Hotel left council calling for swift legal action on the two Downtown Eastside hotels and a broader strategy to clean up rundown rooming houses.
The allegations the residents and their supporters made inside council chambers so alarmed elected officials they had staff contact police to protect the speakers over the weekend from retribution by the landlords.
Sitting in the upstairs foyer out of sight of the general public, one woman broke down in tears as she described the fear of knowing she would almost certainly be evicted by Wolsey for speaking out.
“He came to us this morning and said if we say anything, we’ll be in trouble. I didn’t want to come here because I really am scared we will get evicted,” she said. Mayor Gregor Robertson commended her for her bravery, saying the city would try to protect her.
Half a dozen of the two hotels’ residents were escorted to the balcony shortly before the meeting to shield their identities, marking the first time the city has ever done this.
Wolsey did not appear before council, although he had asked to be the first speaker. His absence, however, didn’t stop the city from taking extraordinary steps to protect the speakers’ anonymity, including asking media not to photograph any of them.
It also didn’t stop council from approving, for the first time, a new and powerful tool to make Wolsey, Robinson and other landlords they said abuse residents clean up their act.
Council unanimously approved a request for injunctive relief on both the Wonder Rooms on East Cordova and the Palace Hotel on West Hastings, meaning the city will take Wolsey, Robinson and their companies to court if they don’t quickly repair a long list of deficiencies. Failure to comply would expose the men to contempt of court charges, a criminal charge that carries far more weight than city bylaws.
Speaking for the most part in soft voices, the residents described a litany of horrendous living conditions, including rats, mice and cockroach infestations, non-working or overcrowded shared bathrooms and serious problems with bedbugs.
They said their rents were arbitrary and some had been evicted with zero notice simply because they had complained. Others claimed Wolsey “offered” them work at $3 to $5 per hour but frequently never paid them.
Mayor Robertson asked one man what his living conditions were like.
“Well, we have mice but at least the mice eat the cockroaches,” the man said.
The residents were supported by neighbours in other downtown hotels as well as activists from the Downtown Eastside Neighbourhood Council and VANDU, the Vancouver Area Network of Drug Users. They all laid out fresh allegations that Wolsey, a former pharmacist who was cited by the province several years ago for over-billing on methadone treatments, was using his connections with pharmacies to intimidate the residents. Many of those who live in the hotels are in methadone treatment programs.
Ivan Drury, a member of the neighbourhood council, said Wolsey and Robinson set up the hotels under non-profit societies so they could be classified as “recovery houses.” That allows the men to have a medical role in dispensing or controlling the residents’ methadone prescriptions, he said. Instead, Wolsey, the main actor, has used the hotels to prey upon society’s most vulnerable people, he said.
“I think the landlord is a bully and a thug and a gangster,” Drury told council.
One hotel resident described how he used a “methadone broker” to trade his prescription for a $10-a-week reward from Wolsey. Another described how Wolsey appeared to vary the efficacy of the treatments.
“When he’s happy with you, you get a good dose. When he’s not, you don’t,” the person told councillors in the chamber.
Another resident said that when Wolsey learned he might appear before council, he had his methadone prescription cancelled. The man had it reinstated in time to address the politicians.
The allegations stunned councillors, including Kerry Jang, a doctor who demanded the city to investigate.
“This is really quite frightening,” Jang said.
Deputy City Manager Sadhu Johnston told council the city was already aware of the allegations and that the police department had opened its own investigation.
Tom Hammel, deputy chief licence inspector, said the city had noted at least 265 infractions at the two hotels. By Thursday, Wolsey had only acted on about 60 of them, and all of the work was done without proper permits. None of the repairs require residents to be evicted, he said.
Hammel said the city could seek a contempt-of-court citation against the owners if they don’t comply.
But Wolsey’s hotels, while bad, aren’t the only ones that need to be cleaned up, several councillors said.
Coun. Tim Stevenson said he wants the city to set up two “task forces” to clean up problem hotels. He proposed one should investigate the connection between the methadone treatment program and residential hotels, particularly those controlled by Wolsey and Robinson. He wants the province, health authorities, College of Pharmacists of B.C. and College of Physicians and Surgeons to join the city in the investigation.
He also proposed a task force that “would focus on tenant and landlord education and take a coordinated approach to integrated enforcement to improve the living conditions in all SROs (single-room occupancy hotels).”
Council will debate both motions next week.
On Wednesday, the Pivot Legal Society launched a class-action lawsuit against Wolsey and Robinson on behalf of residents of the Wonder Rooms. Drury, who was part of the action, said Pivot will file similar papers for the Palace Hotel next week.
The tenants are demanding compensation for unfit living conditions.
“It’s just really run down; not taken care of. We’ve got rats, cockroaches, mould,” said Kirk Gerboth, a one-and-a-half-year resident of the Wonder Rooms. “It’s not right.”
Gerboth said in the time he’s lived in the SRO, rats have eaten his clothes and cockroaches have destroyed his personal property. He added that he was concerned he would be evicted for speaking out against Wolsey.
Doug King, legal counsel for the group and a lawyer with Pivot Legal Society, said the tenants deserve to be compensated for the troubles they’ve been through.
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