Nanaimo city council is looking at creating a tenant protection bylaw that would provide renters who are displaced from redevelopment with additional support.
The report, which was presented at the June 15, governance and priorities committee meeting, recommends that building owners provide tenants with a minimum of four months’ rent in either a lump sum or as rent-free living arrangements paid by the termination of the tenancy.
While Nanaimo does not have a tenants union, Harland Bird, a spokesperson for the Victoria Tenants Union, called the proposed bylaw in Nanaimo particularly bare-bones compared to other municipalities.
“A few months of free rent and moving expenses does not protect tenants from homelessness from perpetual housing insecurity,” Bird said.
At committee meeting, Coun. Paul Manly said the bylaw was “not going to make anybody happy, because tenants and tenant associations are going to want more, and developers are going to want to provide less.”
Staff are expected to bring a draft bylaw back to council later this summer, following engagement with tenant advocates and developers on the recommendations.
Advocates say proposed bylaw won’t protect renters
The proposed bylaw would apply to buildings with four or more rental units. Currently, tenants are entitled to one month’s rent under the provincial Residential Tenancy Act if they’re evicted due to redevelopment.
Tenants would also receive money to help cover moving costs and have the right of first refusal to rent a comparable unit in the new building or another unit owned by the landlord. However, tenant advocates are critical that the proposed bylaw would still leave tenants in the lurch.
Unlike a similar bylaw that was recently adopted in Victoria, where tenants have the right to move back into a new unit at 20 per cent below market rent, the bylaw in Nanaimo would not require that previous tenants receive any discount on the new units.
“The proposed right of first refusal in Nanaimo is insane,” Bird told The Discourse. “It leaves any discount for moving into a new place up to the developer, which is even worse than we have in Victoria, and the one we have in Victoria is effectively useless.”
However, even with a discount in Victoria, market rents are unaffordable for displaced families who have lived in rent-controlled apartments for decades, according to Bird.
“They are essentially stuck there and terrified to move, because they know that if they do, they’re going to be getting a huge rent increase,” he said.
The average market rent for a private apartment — across various apartment sizes — in Nanaimo was $1,685 in October 2025 according to the Canadian Mortgage and Housing Corporation’s annual rental market report and was $1,714 in Victoria.
Because the tenants Bird works with are lower-income, a number of them have been relocated multiple times as they often move into older apartment buildings that are also at a high-risk of redevelopment.
“It is so crucial that we don’t keep displacing people from their homes and destroying affordable buildings, and that is what we’re seeing in Victoria and many other places, and I suspect that’s what we will also see as a result of this in Nanaimo,” he said.
The proposed policy in Nanaimo is for the four months rent provided to tenants to be based on either the tenant’s current rent or the average rent for a comparable unit according to the Canadian Mortgage and Housing Corporation.
The amount provided for moving costs would be $1,000 for studio and one-bedroom apartments, $1,250 for two-bedroom apartments and $1,400 for three or more bedrooms. The compensation could be provided as either a lump sum, free rent or a combination of the two.
“As a renter myself, I know how scary it can be when you have to move, especially if you’ve been living somewhere a long time,” said Coun. Hilary Eastmure. “The vacancy rate is still pretty low in Nanaimo, and if you’re trying to stay in the same neighbourhood, or if you have a pet, or accessibility challenges, it is extremely difficult.”
Burnaby tenant protection bylaw the ‘gold standard’ in B.C.
Bird said the “gold standard” for municipal tenant protection bylaws is in Burnaby where tenants have the right to move back into the new buildings at the same rent they were paying. Developers also have to pay for any difference in rent — up to 15 per cent of the current rent or 30 per cent above the median rent for a similar unit in the same neighbourhood — while the new building is under construction.
According to the City of Burnaby website, 91 households have moved back into new buildings at the same rent they paid before redevelopment, plus allowable rent increases allowed by the Residential Tenancy Act. The remaining replacement units are available as affordable housing units Tenants are expected to move into three new buildings this year and a total of 1,900 replacement units will be available for 34 redevelopment projects that have either been completed or are in progress.
Nanaimo city staff shared a financial analysis by Urban Systems with council which said a similar right of first refusal in Nanaimo “would have significant impact on the economic viability of redevelopment” in the city and did not recommend it.
“If Burnaby can do it, other municipalities can do it as well, and they’re not,” Bird said. “They’re displacing people from their affordable homes, destroying those affordable homes and replacing them with unaffordable ones in the name of helping these people, which is just egregious.”
A best practices report prepared for the City of Nanaimo says nearly all municipalities offer a right of first refusal, and rising rents in the city means that even discounted market rents may be unaffordable for current tenants. It suggests the city may want to cap rents for relocated tenants at either the current rent or a percentage increase of current rents, but warned this could impact future project viability.
The options presented to council included an “enhanced approach” for a stronger tenant protection bylaw that would have included relocation assistance be provided to tenants by the property owner.
Nanaimo Mayor Leonard Krog said he was glad the staff report did not recommend relocation assistance for tenants that would require the developer to provide a list of three comparable apartments they could rent.
“I think that is stretching things too far into the rights of owners,” he said.
Manly said affordable rental buildings were demolished in Burnaby and is interested in feedback from stakeholders when the bylaw is presented.
Emily Rogers, director of operations for the Together Against Poverty Society which helps renters in Nanaimo with legal advocacy, said she would like to see council increase the amount of compensation for tenants and look to other municipalities like Victoria.
She said the four months of rent is really only three additional months as it includes the one month already required under the provincial Residential Tenancy Act and is not adequate compensation for being displaced from their home.
“The right of first refusal with affordable rent is incredibly important,” she said. “It’s the only way to truly mitigate the impact of redevelopment on existing communities.”
Krog said he appreciates the proposed recommendations don’t go far enough for tenants, but said council has to consider what housing will be built in the future.
“Today’s unaffordable housing is tomorrow’s affordable housing,” he said.
Krog said the bylaw is still early in the process and he expects to see “a lot of commentary, frankly, from landlords” as they have a direct financial interest.
“It’s a question of finding that balance where industry continues to respond by building units and tenants are in a position to be able to pay a reasonable rent,” he said, adding that senior levels of government need to address affordability.
Provincial vacancy control needed, tenant advocates say
In 2024, the province made changes to the Community Charter and Local Government Act to give local governments the power to create tenant protection bylaws if they wish to provide additional support for tenants displaced due to redevelopment. Regional districts do not have the same authority.
Tenant protection bylaws are only for tenants who are displaced due to the demolition of the building they are renting, not renovations and repairs.
“Ultimately, the responsibility for this does lie with the province,” Bird said. “They are the ones that have really mandated all of this redevelopment and this densification. We do need more housing, but we need social housing.”
Bird said the province has given municipalities limited tools to be able to respond to the housing crisis while putting pressure on them to facilitate densification and redevelopment. But he also noted that the City of Nanaimo could put in more protections for tenants than is in the proposed bylaw.
Rogers said without provincial vacancy control — where rent on empty units is tied to the previous rent — the changes won’t make a material difference for tenants who are displaced.
“Without vacancy control, everything else we are doing is plugging holes on a sinking ship,” she said.
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