Big Victories for Hamilton ACORN!

August was a crucial month for ACORN in Hamilton! Members won new tenant protections by securing new bylaws and changes in existing bylaws.

New Safe Apartment Bylaw for Healthy homes: Since 2017 ACORN has been fighting for a city wide proactive apartment inspection program based on RentSafe from the City of Toronto. After a 6 year campaign, City Council voted unanimously to pass the Safe Apartment Bylaw. The bylaw requires landlords to register with the City of Hamilton and fulfil a comprehensive set of requirements to ensure health and safety in apartment buildings with 6 or more units with 2 or more stories.

Tenant Defence Fund: In 2021, ACORN won an expansion of the Tenant Defence Fund to cover N13 renovictions and demoviction. Since then ACORN has been asking for increase in funding to the program. ACORN won a substantial increase in funding to the program and improvements to make it easier for tenant groups to get legal representation.

Changes to the Vital Services bylaw: ACORN won important changes to the vital services bylaw which will go a long way in protecting tenants better during vital services disruptions and hold landlords accountable. The updates were driven from the situation at 1083 Main Street East in downtown Hamilton where a handful of tenants went 86 days without any running water.

For more details on each of these changes, click here: https://acorncanada.org/news/after-6-year-campaign-acorn-hamilton-wins-city-wide-annual-proactive-inspections-of-apartments-plus-other-big-wins-on-the-tenant-defence-program/

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