Regulations for short term rentals (STRs) were on the agenda for Winnipeg's Executive Policy Committee (EPC) during their December 7th meeting. The minutes, recording and written submissions are available on the City Clerk's Office Decision Making Information System (DMIS) https://clkapps.winnipeg.ca/DMIS/ViewDoc.asp?DocId=22794&SectionId=&InitUrl=

Whether it improves the sustainability of your condo operations, reduces waste, increases energy efficiency, reduces water consumption or just beautifies the environment surrounding your property, we’d like to hear from you - just send us an email with a subject line of “CCI Green Condo Page”. We hope to hear from you soon. Please send any comments or suggestions to cci.mb.news@gmail.com.

CCI held its second virtual National Leaders Forum and Conference May 28-29. The next one in the fall will be virtual as well, but we can all look forward to the expected in-person event in the spring of 2022.

As was the case for the conference in the fall of 2020, there was a diverse set of topics covered with ample opportunity to ask questions of the presenters. What follows are some of my lessons learned.

We encourage you to submit suggestions for improving the Provincial Condo Act to us via https://cci-manitoba.ca/resources/the-condominium-act-suggestions-for-improvement. We have started posting these ‘suggestions for improvement’ in our quarterly Condominium News and Views. In case you missed the improvement suggestions in the prior editions, have a look at the Fall 2020, Winter 2021 and Spring 2021 editions at https://cci-manitoba.ca/members-only/newsletter-archive

The Province has a useful website with a guide to the Act and links to the Act itself, and the associated regulation and various related forms. The website link is
https://www.gov.mb.ca/condo/. 

We wrote to the Standing Policy Committee on Property and Development, Heritage, and Downtown Development (SPC-PDHD) asking to be included in their stakeholder consultations as we could provide the perspectives from condominium owners, investors, boards and residents, along with the perspectives of our professional members and business partners.

In the past year I set up a GIC-ladder in our condo corporation’s (CC’s) reserve fund to counteract the meager interest rates payable in most savings accounts. First, I determined the surplus in the account in relation to our needs over the next five years, taking into account our projections for reserve fund contributions (RFCs) and the projected spending based on our current reserve fund study (RFS). Given that interest rates are likely going up over the next few years, I then split the surplus amount into five lumps and invested each lump in a GIC, with terms of one, two, three, four and five years. The plan is to follow a similar thought process to rollover principal and interest into five year GICs along with any additional surplus each year onward.

We wrote to the Standing Policy Committee on Water and Waste, Riverbank Management and the Environment (SPC-WWRME) offering our involvement to come up with a MFWD fee that would be fair and equitable to condo corporations and their unit owners, residents, tenants and investors. We did receive a favorable response from the Committee Chair, Councilor Mayes, and subsequently had a Zoom meeting with him on March 22nd. The meeting was cordial and informative, and Councilor Mayes has since put us in touch with the appropriate City Staff. He indicated he will keep us apprised of any developments, but didn’t expect any meaningful activity until after the fall municipal elections.