Concordia students hold press conference to present research on condo conversions

by CKUT Community News Collective

On January 16th Concordia University urban planning students in instructor Ted Rutland’s Urban Laboratory class held a press conference to announce the results of their semester-long research study into condo conversion development in Montreal’s Petite Patrie borough, which in recent years has been leaving more and more low income rental tenants in the neighborhood displaced.

Partnering with Martin Blanchard, community organizer at Comite logement de la Petite Patrie, Rutland and his twenty-four students put in thousands of hours studying municipal and provincial government databases, to prove that a major legal loophole exists in Montreal’s decades –old condo conversion moratorium, a loophole that is putting tenants at risk.

In these highlights from the press conference, recorded by CKUT volunteer Susan Fitch, students Zoe Pearce, Athanasios Boutas, and Robert Seitzberg describe some key points in the results of their class’s research, and offering recommendations on how to solve the problem of Montreal’s flawed condo conversion moratorium.

bar baz