Long list of rules pits Mississauga neighbours against townhouse board

A Mississauga, Ont., couple is in the midst of a war of words with their townhouse complex’s board of directors — which a handful of residents say is imposing unnecessarily strict new rules on the complex’s roughly 140 homeowners.

Janet Kitson said her problems began in 2022, when some new members joined the board of directors at 3050 Orleans Rd., in the Winston Churchill Boulevard-Dundas Street neighbourhood.

That board issued an updated set of regulations that residents must live by — standard procedure for most condos and townhouse complexes. But on Orleans Road, that list grew from about 30 in 2010, the last time the list was updated, to more than 70 in 2022.

The new list includes regulations barring people from painting their fences, residents say, as well as limiting what pets they can own and banning certain plants from people’s gardens.

“It’s frustrating. It’s stressful,” Kitson said. “You need rules so there isn’t anarchy, (but) this is almost like dog eat dog.”

Shortly after the board circulated the new list among homeowners, Kitson complained to her neighbours and wrote a petition asking that the new rules be reviewed by the complex’s membership. In response, she says, the board issued another new set of rules in 2023, this one including a rule banning gazebos — which she has had in her backyard for 20 years, without complaint.

“It’s almost as though we’re being targeted,” said Kitson, who’s lived in the home with her spouse Joe Ferretti for 34 years.

“I want them to just leave me alone.”

The gazebo-banning list was approved in a January 2024 membership vote. 

Of 141 homeowners in the complex, 55 took part in the vote, according to a letter from Malvern Condominium Property Management to homeowners. 

Kitson said the battles between her and her allies, and the board and its supporters, have divided the complex and shattered at least one of her friendships. 

“In the last two years, it’s become not a community,” she said.

“Everybody’s watching everybody else.”

Mona Usajewicz, one of the Orleans Road board members, told CBC Toronto the board would not be commenting and directed inquiries to Chris Poland, a Malvern vice-president.

New rules lawfully enacted, says Malvern exec

Poland pointed out in a statement to CBC Toronto that the new rules were passed by a majority of homeowners at the January meeting, as is required under the province’s Condominium Act, and that the board is now enforcing those rules.

Condo law expert Audrey Loeb, of law firm Shibley Righton, said there are lessons to be learned from the complaints levelled by the Orleans Road residents.

Prospective buyers should be aware that when they’re moving into a townhouse complex or a condo, which are both governed in Ontario by the Condominium Act, individual tastes can be trumped by broader community interests.

“What it really says is if you’re going to live in a community you have to understand that you’re going to be governed by the decisions of the majority,” she said. “You may not like it but that’s what condominium living is, and that’s really the takeaway.”

Loeb said condo boards don’t have carte blanche to draft any rules they choose.

She said rules must be “reasonable,” and if a resident believes that line is being crossed, they can take their complaint to the Condominium Authority Tribunal (CAT), or they can go directly to Ontario Superior Court.

“And if the CAT finds, or the court finds, that it is reasonable, you’re stuck with it,” Loeb said.

Kitson recently received a letter from the board’s lawyer, insisting that she remove the gazebo, which she says she will not be doing. She says it has been on her back deck for decades and should be allowed to stay — a position that Loeb agrees with.

She said a condo board’s rules cannot impose new restrictions on existing amenities, like gazebos.

“Even if there had been (a rule against a particular amenity) in place, if it hadn’t been enforced for 25 years, I doubt that a court would order it be removed now,” she said.

Homeowners critique board’s enforcement

The most sensible way forward, she said, would be for the complex’s board to allow the gazebo to stay, provided it be removed when Kitson sells.

Other homeowners at the complex told CBC Toronto that they agreed that some of the new rules were heavy-handed and also objected to other decisions the board has made about the properties in the complex.

Georgena Bowles, who’s lived in the complex for more than 30 years, says she is concerned about the arbitrary nature with which some board decisions are enforced.

“I don’t think they should force us to do some of the things they want,” she said.

For instance, she says the board recently installed a sprinkler outside her home and has tapped into her water supply to feed it. She says she had no choice in the matter. “They say they’re going to reimburse me for the water. I have to pay for it first.”

As well, the board had her and her neighbours’ garage doors painted “arbitrarily.”

“We should have got a vote on it,” Bowles said. “They’re telling us what we can do, and what we can’t do.”

Loeb points out that a resident who believes a particular rule is too onerous also has the authority under the Condo Act to call a meeting and have that rule re-written, or even repealed, provided they have a majority of owners on their side.

The bottom line though? Loeb suggests new condo or townhouse owners do their homework before moving in.

“There are rules, there are provisions that may restrict what you can and cannot do and you have to abide by them,” Loeb said.

“You get what’s called a status certificate and all those documents (building or complex rules) are attached.,” she said. ” But people don’t read them because it’s overwhelming in size. That’s the problem.”

All in all, Loeb said, in her experience she doesn’t find that boards bring in unreasonable rules very often.