Amendment to zoning bylaw offers hope to evicted Glen Elm trailer park tenants

With an eviction date quickly approaching, residents at the Glen Elm Mobile Home Community in Regina are feeling encouraged by a recent decision made by city council.

“We are moving, personally, from a state of despair to one of quiet hope,” said Randall Edge, president of the Glen Elm Retirement Community Residents Association.

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Ward 6 Councillor Victoria Flores brought forward a motion to allow manufactured and mobile homes to be moved into residential lots by the end of this year. The motion passed unanimously at a council meeting at the end of March.

Ward 2 Councillor George Tsiklis added an amendment to the motion that would allow the city to support people who are being evicted, as some of the community’s residents say they may lose their homes simply because they can’t be removed.

City administration is set to report back on the amendment at Wednesday’s council meeting, detailing the support that could be offered to people who are displaced from their homes, along with new steps to protect tenants.

“We were really quite astonished by the level of interest of all the members of city council,” Edge said.

Fourteen residents of the trailer park were issued notices at the beginning of the year by Glen Elm Properties Ltd., saying their rental agreements were being terminated early.

The notice explained that the main water and sewage infrastructure connected to some homes in the trailer court has reached a “state of catastrophic failure,” and the decision to end the agreements prematurely was due to the cost and frequency of repairs.

In March, another wave of eviction notices was issued, with the company citing similar water infrastructure problems and requiring residents to be off the property by the end of June.

Edge was one of the people who received the notices.

He said the community has about 150 homes, and 30 to 40 of them are connected to the City of Regina’s water system, which means they might be able to stay on the property.

Edge said he’s still waiting for answers from the property manager as to why the water and sewer lines have reached a state of failure.

“We send $1.3 million in (land fees) to the property owner. That puts upon him a bit of a responsibility to adequately maintain the system,” he said.

Kelly Bennefeld, another resident in the mobile community, said she was pleased to hear that more help could be coming from city council at the Wednesday meeting.

She and her family also received a notice, and are expected to be out of the park by end of June.

“(I’m) regretting moving in here,” Bennefeld said, adding that she’s frustrated, upset and disappointed by the situation.

Bennefeld said she’s working with her brother to sell the mobile home where she lives, but is worried about the tight timeline. She said she has concerns about finding a place to live that will fit her family and her pets by the end of June.

“I’m just going day by day and dealing with what comes up,” she said.

980 CJME has reached out to Glen Elm Properties for a response.