Legalized Theft?

The owners of two rundown buildings on Vancouver’s Downtown Eastside have received offers of up to $25-million for properties that the city wants to expropriate for $1 each, says a lawyer representing the owners.

Those offers call into question the city’s valuation of the Regent and Balmoral hotels and how it is seeking to gain control of them, Evan Cooke said in an interview Sunday.

The owners, Vancouver’s Sahota family, have said for months that they are willing to sell or lease both buildings to the city but have been unable to reach a deal and were taken aback by a staff recommendation that the city pursue expropriation for $1 for each of the properties, he said.

“I would say they are in shock, to some extent, that the City of Vancouver, or at least the staff, have decided to recommend this approach to dealing with the Balmoral and Regent hotel problems,” Mr. Cooke said, adding that B.C.’s Expropriation Act requires owners to be paid market value for expropriated property interests whether or not the owners have a history of bylaw violations.

“The decisions that have been made to date are very much motivated by conflict with the owners,” he said.

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