Tenants told to vacate Winnipeg apartment without warning on Friday
CBC
Dozens of tenants were given cash and told to immediately vacate a Winnipeg apartment on the weekend after a notice saying the building is shut down was posted at the front entrance.
A bed mattress, bags of clothes and furniture were piled near a garbage bin outside Stratford Hall, a three-storey apartment building located on 285 College Ave. on Tuesday.
Some tenants could be seen loading their belongings into a moving truck or vehicle while others sat outside holding a few suitcases with nowhere to go.
"I really don't have anywhere to stay," said Megan Levasseur, who saw signage indicating the building was shutting down on Friday when she came home at 10 p.m.
She said there were people blocking the entrance that evening to prevent residents from going inside to collect their belongings.
A spokesperson from the City of Winnipeg said the Winnipeg Fire Paramedic Service attended the site on Friday and found that some fire safety systems were not operational. WFPS ordered that the exits must remain clear and that a "fire watch" be put in place over the weekend, the city said in an email on Tuesday.
"The WFPS did not order a vacate of the building at any time. It is our understanding that the owner made the decision to vacate the property," the city said.
On Saturday, Levasseur said she returned to her apartment and found her suite had been emptied and her furniture and clothes were thrown in the back lane.
"It's sad. We cried. A lot of us cried yesterday, you know what I mean, just a lot of crying happening," Levasseur said, adding that she feels confused, disappointed and frustrated.
"Last night I slept out on the street because when I got to the shelter, it was already full because there's really no room for people in the shelters if you get there too late," she said.
Levasseur said she was experiencing homelessness before she got help through St.Boniface Street Links, which connected her to housing at Stratford Hall six months ago. She said the landlords paid tenants to leave.
Ivy Palmer said her brother, who's on disability and lived in the building for four years when it was under a different owner, was offered a bit more than a month of rent to vacate the building on Saturday morning.
She said her brother never received an official eviction notice or a warning that the residence was uninhabitable.
She spoke with the City of Winnipeg on Saturday, and says she was told to "go down there and advocate for your brother." When she arrived, she saw people, mainly women, holding their belongings on the boulevard and crying.
