Patrick J. Harrington

The moving party brought a motion for leave to appeal a decision of the Ontario Land Tribunal.

The Divisional Court dismissed the motion for leave to appeal.

No costs were awarded as the responding party failed to file a costs outline.

The plaintiff developer brought an action against the City of Guelph seeking reimbursement for local service charges paid for road improvements as a condition of subdivision approval.

The City moved to strike the claim, arguing the court lacked jurisdiction and the action was an abuse of process because the developer failed to appeal the conditions to the Local Planning Appeal Tribunal under the Planning Act.

The Superior Court granted the motion, finding that the developer was improperly attempting to circumvent the statutory appeal scheme and collaterally attack municipal by-laws, making it plain and obvious the claim could not succeed.

The appellant tenant appealed a decision of the Landlord and Tenant Board granting the respondent landlord an above-guideline rent increase based on capital expenditures for balcony repairs.

The tenant argued the Board erred in law by failing to properly determine if the expenditures were necessary to restore physical integrity, failing to provide adequate analysis, and failing to apply issue estoppel based on a previous 2012 application.

The Divisional Court dismissed the appeal, finding the Board's decision was reasonable, as it properly applied the legal test, made factual findings that the work was different from the previous application, and adequately supported its conclusion that the repairs were necessary eligible capital expenditures.

The landlord appealed a Landlord and Tenant Board decision ordering it to repay illegally collected rent, arguing the leases were void under s. 50(3) of the Planning Act because the Residential Tenancies Act's automatic renewal provisions effectively created leases exceeding 21 years.

The tenants cross-appealed the Board's decision to limit their repayment to a one-year period.

The Divisional Court dismissed both appeals, finding that statutory renewal does not trigger the Planning Act's subdivision control provisions, estoppel cannot override the RTA's prohibition on illegal rent, and the Board reasonably applied the one-year limitation period for collecting illegal rent.

The appellant landlord appealed a decision of the Landlord and Tenant Board ordering a 10% rent abatement for 53 tenants due to alleged failure to maintain the building and interference with reasonable enjoyment.

The Divisional Court allowed the appeal, finding that the Board member's reasons were conclusory, lacked transparency, and failed to analyze the statutory requirements under the Residential Tenancies Act.

The matter was remitted to a differently constituted panel for a re-hearing solely on the issue of the landlord's obligation to repair.

The landlord brought a motion to quash the tenant's appeal of two Landlord and Tenant Board orders (an Arrears Order and a Maintenance Order) and to lift the stay of eviction.

The landlord argued the appeal did not raise a question of law and was out of time.

The court found that while the grounds of appeal primarily related to findings of fact, the allegation that the Board failed to consider relevant evidence could amount to an error of law, so the appeal of the Maintenance Order was not plainly devoid of merit.

However, as the grounds of appeal did not challenge the amount of rent arrears, the court lifted the stay in respect of the Arrears Order and ordered the tenant to pay the arrears and ongoing rent into court or to the landlord, failing which the appeal would be dismissed.

The moving party sought leave to appeal an Ontario Municipal Board decision that found it lacked jurisdiction to hear an appeal regarding a refused tree removal permit.

The right of appeal under s. 136(1) of the Municipal Act had been repealed before the permit was refused.

The court upheld the Board's finding that the moving party had no vested right of appeal upon merely filing the application, as the right only arises upon an actual refusal.

The motion for leave to appeal was dismissed.

The landlord appealed a decision of the Ontario Rental Housing Tribunal that dismissed its application for an above-guideline rent increase related to lobby renovations.

The Adjudicator had dismissed the claim due to missing schedules in the contract and concerns about a non-arms-length relationship between the landlord's agent and the contractor.

The Divisional Court allowed the appeal, finding the Adjudicator erred in law by relying on an irrelevant corporate relationship and breached procedural fairness by failing to consider the landlord's requests to file the missing documents.

The matter was remitted to a different adjudicator for rehearing.