Dozens of people have been abruptly locked out of a Surrey apartment building with little explanation.
Residents of Kwantlen Park Manor said they were given less than 24 hours’ notice to vacate the premises this week, leaving about 30 people scrambling to find somewhere else to stay.
“We just were never given anything in writing so we don’t know what’s going to happen,” said Lisa Greenwood-Fonyo, who lives in the building.
The City of Surrey confirmed it inspected Kwantlen Park Manor recently but said the eviction was not its decision.
“We do have an active investigation but we have been working with the property owner to remedy or address those issues,” said Kim Marosevich, bylaw business operations manager.
Kwantlen Park Manor is owned by the Sahota family, which is well-known in Metro Vancouver for past issues with some of their properties.
In 2012, Gurdyal Singh Sahota and the family’s company, Waterford Developments, were fined $115,000 by the provincial government for refusing to fix a leaky roof at the complex, despite numerous orders to do so.
The fine was the first of its kind in B.C., but ultimately didn’t have to be paid.
“[The province] forgave it on the condition that the building was repaired and brought up to standard,” Surrey-Whalley MLA Bruce Ralston said.
“Some work has clearly been done but whether it’s come up to the standard that was required, not really clear.”
In 2007, the roof collapsed at another one of the Sahotas’ properties in East Vancouver, The Pandora. The residents were evicted in 2015, and the building was condemned pending renovations.
CTV News tried phoning Gurdyal Singh Sahota and stopped by his $3.8-million home in South Granville on Friday, but couldn’t reach him.
With a report from CTV Vancouver’s Jonathan Glasgow
