About fifty residents are appealing to the Superior Court to try to prevent the owner of the private residence for seniors (RPA) Mont-Carmel from converting it into a rental housing complex where fewer services will be offered for a higher rent.
The originating application, of which The duty has obtained a copy, is led by Nicole Jetté, who has lived for 11 years in the RPA on René-Lévesque Boulevard, in downtown Montreal. The lady is acting on behalf of 52 other residents of the facility, the vast majority of whom are over 75 years old.
On January 31, the daily life of some 200 residents of the establishment was turned upside down when they learned in an eviction notice that the new owner intended to convert it into a rental housing complex where basic services APR features – such as nurse presence and panic buttons – will no longer be offered. Residents, who will become tenants when the building is converted this summer, will also be subject to a 3% increase in their rent.
However, they do not intend to let it go, especially since the new owner of the building since last December, the LRM Group, had undertaken in the notarized deed of sale to maintain the vocation of the building as a private residence for seniors. .
After filing, unsuccessfully, multiple requests in opposition to the change of assignment of the RPA last February, the residents took the next step Tuesday by filing a request for an interlocutory and permanent injunction before the Superior Court.
In their motion, for which they have used the services of lawyers specializing in housing law Manuel Johnson and Julien Delangie, they ask the court to order the new owner to “immediately stop” the work to convert this building into a rental complex. and to “take the necessary measures to maintain the services provided by the private residence for seniors Mont-Carmel” as well as the RPA certification of the building.
More details will follow.