Real Estate Law - OFSC

The appellant condominium corporation requested a reconsideration of a Fire Safety Commission decision which found that storage lockers in its parking garage violated the Ontario Fire Code.

The appellant argued the Commission breached procedural fairness by not making individual locker owners parties to the appeal, and erred in its statutory interpretation of the Fire Code and Building Code.

The Commission dismissed the reconsideration request, finding that individual owners must initiate an appeal or seek party status to be included, and that no errors of law or fact were made in the original decision regarding fire separation requirements.

The appellant condominium corporation appealed a Fire Marshal review decision confirming an inspection order that required the removal of household items from wire-caged storage lockers located in an underground parking garage.

The appellant argued that the individual locker owners should have been made parties, that the storage complied with the Ontario Fire Code, and that an exemption applied because the lockers complied with the Ontario Building Code.

The Fire Safety Commission dismissed the appeal, finding no breach of procedural fairness in not adding the individual owners.

The Commission held that the Fire Code requires parking garages to be fire-separated from the rest of the building, meaning household items cannot be stored in unseparated lockers.

The Commission also found insufficient evidence that the lockers complied with the Building Code, as approved drawings only permitted bicycle storage.

The review decision was amended to expressly permit bicycle storage and to extend the compliance date.