Rent controls needed before it's too late

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The rich get richer.

The poor get poorer.

That's the lesson behind the new year's early Christmas gift for the poor as landlords jack up rental accommodation by as much as 25 per cent for 1990.

Already beleaguered inner-city residents, many of whom are elderly and are on fixed incomes, will probably face one of the worst housing crisis in years in Edmonton.

More and more poor people, including many Native people who fall in that category, are knocking on the doors of such places as the Boyle Street Co-op and the Edmonton Inner City Society as they desperately struggle to find an affordable place to live.

It's all a sign of the times, say some landlords and developers who say that the rental 'holiday' for Edmontonians are over and local renters should expect to pay as much as anyone else for decent accommodation in the 1990's.

Rental holiday? Considering that Edmontonians in the 1980's came through one of the worst recessions in modern Canadian history, you have to wonder where this kind of assessment comes from.

It's time for landlords to wake up and smell the coffee because the shoe can fit on the other foot, too.

The provincial government has at its fingertips a chance to play the responsible role in helping the poor and needy who clearly cannot afford to pay the outrageous rents that money-grubbing landlords are foisting on renters.

Before it's too late, the government should act quickly and decisively to implement rent controls in this province before rent hikes get out of control and force the poor and elderly out on the street.

With the city's vacancy rate at its lowest since 1981, renters are at the mercy of landlords.

Given the state of housing in some sectors of the city, there's no question that while the price of rental accommodation will be going up, it's very unlikely that the quality of decent housing will reflect that price hike in the tenement-like housing offered by slum landlords in the city.

Time and time again, unscrupulous landlords have been forced to upgrade housing conditions to a tolerable, decent level only after complaints have been lodged by renters.

In this city alone, there are people who are living in housing without proper plumbing, without heat, with faulty and dangerous wiring. You name it, you'll find it in this city.

Skyrocketing rent hikes are a reflection of the times, as some landlords say.

That's a telling statement. Because what it really shows is the difference between those in society who put profit before compassion, self-interest before the common good.

Landlords do not have to jack up rents by astronomical amounts. They should have a legitimate right to profit from their endeavors but not to the point of gouging renters, particularly those who cannot afford to live anywhere else.