Topics discussed in this episode:
- Status updates
- Capital work projects - what can be delayed
- Safety and security planning tracker - preparing now for tomorrow
- Quarantine: What can be enforced, and how?
- Q & A
Download the presentation for this webinar
Transcript
CONDOVIRUS EPISODE 3
Rod: Okay, good evening everybody. My name is Rod Escayola and I 'm a condominium lawyer with Gowling WLG. Welcome to Condovirus Episode 3. As we 've done last week, this being the third episode I decided that I would title it the "Last Crusade". One of the greatest trilogy ever, I guess, in my humble opinion. That 's today 's topic. For those who have been with us in the past you know that what we 've done, in response to the COVID-19 pandemic, we 've struck together an industry wide crisis prevention cell to help the condominium industry navigate through these difficult times. What we have today is a panel of experts, as we have had in the past. You 'll recognize many of the same characters. The same heroes ganging up against the same foe and I 'll introduce them right away to you.
First, there 's Sandy Foulds, from Wilson Blanchard Management. Good evening, Sandy.
Sandy: Good evening.
Rod: We have Katherine Gow on behalf of the Association of Condo Managers of Ontario. Good evening, Katherine.
Katherine: Hi everyone.
Rod: We have Denise Lash, founder of Lash Condo Law. She 's also speaking on behalf of the Community Association Institute of Canada. Good evening, Denise.
Denise: Good evening, Rod.
Rod: Graeme: MacPherson from Gowlings. Good evening, Graeme:.
Graeme: Hi everybody.
Rod: And we have David Plotkin, also from Gowling WLG. Good evening, David.
David: Good evening, everyone.
Rod: Two more. Jason Reid from the National Life Safety Group. Very lucky to have him tonight. Hi, Jason.
Jason: Good evening, everyone.
Rod: Finally, we have Justin Tudor from Keller Engineering. Good evening, Justin.
Justin: Hey, Rod.
Rod: Okay. We have a very full agenda tonight and, as we 've done in the past, there 's going to be a lot of information. We 're going to try to condense it. We try to give you practical information. Not just too much blah, blah, but really information that you can use. We 're going to cram as many answers as we can. We may spill over, slightly over an hour, because we just have such a full agenda and hopefully you can stick around until then. As we have in the past, there 's a chat channel. So for those of you who are familiar with it, feel free to chat between yourselves, or share questions. You can access the chat channel either to the top or bottom or side of your screen. If you move your mouse you 'll get to see there 's a green bar. The green bar will get you to be able to activate the chat. We ask you to please focus on what we say because often we get questions and you missed the question because you were busy chatting and then you feel disappointed because you feel we haven 't answered. So try to do both. Try to do two things at once. Naturally we can 't answer every question that you have, and we regret that, but we 've received many questions from you. We 're going to try to focus on the main questions that are repeated throughout. Please keep in mind that we 're broadcasting this out of Ontario and so most of our references to legislation is Ontario based. If you are from a different jurisdiction you 'll have to adapt our reality to yours or vice versa. Keep in mind, also, that the information we provided today is valid, as much as possible, as of the date of this broadcast on April 1. As some of you will watch this later on, because we 'll upload the information to our website, the webinar to our website, so some of you may watch this later. Please keep in mind that the information changes on an hourly basis. Now most importantly, keep in mind that the information we provide you today is general in nature. It may not necessarily apply to your specific situation. It 's very important that you seek advice from professionals that will tailor the information and adapt it to your very specific set of circumstances. That was the waiver if you 've ever recognized one. The last thing I 'll say is that this webinar is recorded and, as I said, we 'll upload it on the Condo Advisor site, condoadvisor.ca. You 'll be able to watch it again for your viewing pleasure for weeks to come. Let 's start as we did in the past with an update on any sort of recent changes that may have taken place this past week. Maybe I can ask David to discuss the New Age Subsidiary Program introduced by the Federal government this week. Does that apply to condominiums, David? What can you tell us about that?
David: Thank you very much, Rod. This came out very recently and Minister Morneau just provided some further details today. The Canadian Emergency Wage Subsidy, this is different from any previous wage subsidies that were discussed. There was a previous 10% one a few days back. This is for a subsidy equal to 75% of wages for any employee, up to $58,700.00, which translates to about $850.00 a week per employee. The program is apparently available to any type of employer. This is individual, partnership, corporations, and expressly non-profits and not for profits as well. While we haven 't had official confirmation of condos it would seem this would fall under that as well. There seems to be almost no exclusions. In order to qualify an employer must demonstrate it has suffered a reduction in gross revenues of at least 30% in the month of March, April or May, compared to the same month in the previous year. How this is going to be calculated, what falls into it, is all to be determined in the coming weeks. This will all be run through the CRA portal. If you 're not signed up for direct deposit that would be a good time now to do so. The Minister hopes to have the portal, for this program, set up in 3 to 6 weeks time. For independent contractors or self-employeds this is the only exclusion. Those individuals would not be included in this program but could still apply to the emergency response benefit. That 's the $2,000 a month for those who have lost income because of the situation.
Rod: I guess we 're still looking into whether or not that would apply to condos. I realize there 's no exclusion but we may be not be included, well, first you need to have employees. You 've indicated that, and second, you would need to demonstrate that there 's a loss of revenue. That 's perhaps where the challenge will lie. I sure hope that most corporations are not going to suffer a 30% reduction in the revenue. That 's going to be a different problem if we get there. I think it 's something that we 're keeping our eyes on. Do you have any information about Hydro rebates, David?
David: For sure, yeah. And on that wage subsidy, for sure, thinking of it from the property management perspective would be helpful. As you mentioned the 30% reduction revenue probably doesn 't apply to the condo context. As for the Hydro, just a reminder that as of March 24, the Provincial government temporarily, for 45 days so far, lowered the rates to the off-peak hour rates, all 24 hours of the day, 10.1 cents per kilowatt hour. This can save both unit owners and the corporation for their Hydro rates in the common elements up to half of the bills, because on peak periods it 's about 20 cents per kilowatt hour. There 's no confirmation yet on whether after the 45 days that will be extended. But that 's the situation that we 're at right now.
Rod: Wonderful, David. Thanks so much. Now, the first topic we 're going to tackle deals with capital projects and we 're very lucky to have, indeed one of my favourite speakers on the panel tonight, always full of very good information, extremely knowledgeable engineer with Keller Engineering, Justin Tudor. Now he 's just told us that if you ever see his picture freeze, if he puts another picture and you don 't see the live feed, it 's because he 's drinking beer, apparently, and he doesn 't want you to see that. He just told us that a minute ago so keep on eye on your screen.
Justin: In training.
Rod: How focused Justin is. Justin, the first question I have for you is this. There 's a lot of capital work. We 're approaching work season, in many cases, and a lot of us are getting conflicting signals. For instance, on the one hand the Province has included a construction in it 's list of essential services, but on the other hand many of us are hearing that we should postpone all non-urgent work. And by non-urgent work we 're looking at work that 's required to preserve safety and security or work that is required to prevent damage to property. Obviously those, without a doubt, they have to go forward, these projects. But what is it? I mean, should capital work be postponed and how do we tackle this?
Justin: Yeah. Every contractor is thinking that not only they 're essential but they 're totally safe right now. That 's why we 're being bombarded with emails talking about how safe they are. In my opinion, non-urgent work feels like non-urgent work. If you have to decide between the government saying all residential construction is essential and public health saying defer all non-urgent work if possible, side with public health. Non-urgent work is exactly what he says. If it feels like not doing it will be unsafe, you have to fix the balconies. If it feels like deferring the work will render it unsafe, in a very timely nature, you should do it. That means knocking off concrete that 's about to fall. Do that in a safe manner. Or if the operation of the building will be significantly affected if you defer the work, even temporarily, you should be considering that urgent. In the idea that if you need to replace the chiller before the summer, when it gets really hot, you should still be replacing the chiller. The key factor is deferring the work if possible. If you haven 't signed these contracts for the fence replacement, or if you haven 't signed the contract for the minor roof maintenance package that isn 't actually going to cause some leaks, you should defer those as much as possible. They don 't feel urgent. However, if you 've already signed a contract, or you 're mid-way through a project, the issue can become more problematic.
Rod: Okay. How do you deal with that? If you have in fact already signed a contract, and it 's set to start or on the middle of it, what do you do? How do we deal with that? Do you postpone it? Wouldn 't there be some contractual sort of considerations to keep mind? In some cases I assume the contractor perhaps doesn 't want to come, for whatever good reasons, but in other cases we hear that they actually want to come and they want to continue with the work.
Justin: Absolutely. This is about not throwing the baby out with bath water. Not cancelling projects that could reasonably, and safely, proceed just because you want to slow down work right now. There 's just four key factors to consider when they 're doing this. One is safety. We believe that everybody understands what 's going on. The contractor, the owner, everybody should be able to come to a reasonable agreement about an interim delay, if necessary. The first step is safety. If the owners can 't be safe, if the contractor can 't be safe, then you 've got to put a pin in this. Owners not being safe looks like if we 're going into units, if we 're replacing windows, if we 're repairing fan coils, consider your contractual language but have a conversation that looks like we 're going to defer this. If the contractor isn 't sending you the email saying that they 're going to be doing what 's right, then they 're not committing to new protocols that you think are reasonably safe for the contractor. If, though, the work is outside and it has limited interaction with each other and the owners, ... ... ... . Then you need to move onto the next consideration. The impact on the residents. Certainly, if you had planned the parking garage project that you 're engaged in, or half way through because winter prices were right, now you might have 30 or 40 families quarantined and twice as many self-isolating in a building where they all plan to be working during the time, these factors have to be considered. If a conversation comes up where the owner decides, and the contractor are okay with delaying the project another month, that 's a reasonable approach. However, you have to keep in mind, just because the inconvenience has increased, that doesn 't necessarily mean that it should be deferred out of hand. It certainly doesn 't mean that it 's unsafe. These factors get a little more complicated when you think about something like an asphalt project where you have more cars at home, more people in their driveways, less access. These factors have to be considered in that order. Safety, then impact on residents. Then you have to look at your language. Your contractual provisions are going to really guide what you can and can 't do. If you can 't come to a reasonable agreement with your contractor. Look at your provisions. Figure out what 's possible. The fourth factor determining whether you 're deferring a project is really consider the cost of this potential deferment. Are you tied into this price? Is it going to increase in the next 60 days if you don 't accept it? What is it going to look like in Ontario when we have such a short construction season, as it is, and now we only have 2 or 3 months of a very busy summer when everybody gets going? What are the costs of delaying this a full year into 2021 where there could be twice as much work and half as many contractors? I don 't know the answers but you have to think about safety, impact on residents, your contractual requirements and the cost of deferring these projects.
Rod: Okay. I was going to ask you if you had a magic crystal ball to tell us what does the future look like for us.
Justin: It 's all messed up.
Rod: It 's going to be busy, not too busy now, but it 's going to be hectic later. So maybe with a rapid fire kind of approach, Sandy, and Justin, feel free to jump in. I 'm going to ask you, it 's almost a yes or a no answer, but, Sandy, landscaping and spring clean up and lawn maintenance, we go ahead or we stop it?
Sandy: They should go ahead. They don 't have to have contact with residences. All the landscapers are travelling in separate vehicles. They can sanitize their tools. If they don 't our lawns and gardens are going to look like hayfields in a few months. I 'd say yes.
Rod: Okay. Window washing?
Sandy: I 'd say, for the most part, yes. As long as, on high rises, it 's done from the roof. They have very little contact with owners when they 're on swing stages, so, yes.
Rod: Okay. The flip side to that may be this, and we 're going to talk about the kind of work that has to stop, in units for instance, we 're sort of encouraging owners to stop their renovations inside their suites because we don 't want people to come in and out, and if while we 're telling them to hold off on their work, we have our own contractors come in for work that may not feel urgent, I could see how people will say, "What 's that? They 're treating us differently here." The flip side, of course, is that by May or by June you may not be able to see through your window. You got to balance that.
Sandy: If you wait until June or July you may not get a chance to get contractors in to do that work.
Rod: What about garage power washing?
Sandy: That 's one that can probably wait. I really don 't think we want hundreds of residents having to move their cars out for garage power washing. Many of them will be self-isolating and can 't move it anyway. That 's probably one that should wait.
Rod: Somebody, John from Ottawa on the chat line, said about the window washing. He 's right. A lot of their work may require that they transit through common elements. They may have to take the elevators. They may have to go to the roof. They may have to have access to the water supply, so on and so forth. Maybe one to consider there. Sewer cleaning.
Sandy: That 's probably safe to be done.
Rod: I think it 's a good idea. One question that comes often is what about pools? I 'm mainly referring to exterior pools because by now I hope you 've all closed your interior pools. But what about exterior pools? Pool season is upon us. Do we need to open them? Do we need to maintain them? What would you do, Sandy?
Sandy: There 's another thing if we don 't open them pools. The pool companies are worried about West Nile virus. Their recommendation is yes, get your pools open, just open so that they are ready to go but not for resident use yet until the government so dictates we can.
Rod: Okay. I 'm going to switch topics briefly here. I 'm going to talk back to you, Justin. Reserve fund studies. Should we proceed with those? Should we continue and get them done? How do we tackle this?
Justin: One, it 's important to remember there 's functionally two types of reserve fund studies. One with a site visit. One without a site visit. If you 're in a year without a site visit those keep rolling along. Your reserve fund provider, if they 're working from home, or if they 're working from the office, can still roll with that and through these tools can communicate with the board. Your class two 's, or your class one 's, that have a site visit component it 's important to remember that the site visit isn 't necessarily the be all to end all portion of the reserve fund study. Sure it 's a component but these things can roll along. We 're not expecting there not to be a requirement to do a reserve fund study in the years that they 're coming. If you 're up against it ... a lot of reserve fund study, and you have to have an engineer or a reserve fund planner go to a site, engineers have been being the essential service. This can be done safely but I 'd mitigate it as long as you can and if you have to attack it, have a safety plan on it. But you can certainly roll with these providers.
Rod: Okay. Another question that came up, and I hear this quite often. I 'm going to ask you, Justin, first and then maybe Denise you can give us the legal perspective. But some corporations are concerned with cash flow. They fear that maybe some owners won 't be able to pay their common expenses. The question is this, should we consider delaying, or deferring, our contributions into the reserve fund?
Justin: My first thought is, as you say, be careful. There 's a lot of debate about this. It 's always been my position that boards have a responsibility to have a plan, publish that plan and follow that plan. You can 't modify it without going through all the appropriate steps. Including notice of future funding 's. That should be really considered on an individual basis. But what I 'm really trying to stress to you, it should be about a real concern. This shouldn 't be a conversation you even start if you don 't have real concerns about decreasing costs. Not just in case of.
Rod: Alright. Denise, anything to add to that? That was pretty complete.
Denise: Yeah. Not really. I think that 's quite accurate. The only thing is if a corporation wants to change the way that they 're funding the reserve then they have to change the reserve fund plan and there should be good reason for doing so. That 's the only way that they can legally do it, correctly.
Rod: Right. Okay. Maybe one last question. I 'm not sure if you touched upon it, Justin Tudor from Keller Engineering, but what about reserve fund studies that are underway right now. Is there maybe flexibility as to how we would finance them? Does that go into the equation, into the discussion?
Justin: Well, I don 't think there 's flexibility that didn 't exist before, however, reserve fund planners are certainly going to be looked to, to be creative in how they structure their funding models within the window of adequacy that already exists in the legislation. What this could look like is if they 're doing a reserve fund plan, you might look like a lower contribution the first year, but increased in the next two, if that 's the planners definition of adequacy, increasing only by inflation after the first 3 years. Which, it 's mine, and is a commonly understand definition.
Rod: Okay. Well, that 's it. Justin Tudor from Keller Engineering, thank you so very much. Stick around if you want. If at one point in time you want to pipe up and you have something to add, please do so. To the viewers at home, if you see the image freeze and there 's a different image being superimposed, we know that Justin is having a beer. Thanks so much, Justin. Really appreciate it. Next topic. We 're going to switch now to Jason Reid. Jason from National Life Safety Group. Jason is going to introduce what I 've called the Safety and Security Planning Tracker. This is an incredible document. We 've posted on our website and hopefully some of you had a chance to download it. It 's a very comprehensive tool that will help you plan and identify topics of discussions with respect to safety and security. Jason, can you explain to us a bit, what 's the document? What 's the purpose? How does that work exactly?
Jason: Absolutely. Thank you for having me. First of all, I 've had the opportunity to participate in several webinars and I 've had the opportunity to participate in little table top exercise focusing, primarily, on the commercial high rise industry, but all of them are applicable with managing condominiums during the COVID-19 response. Really, why this was developed was we took all the things that we 're considering in commercial high rises, and as you know they 're quite similar to residential high rises, so we took that same format and applied that to a document that you can actually download, print and handwrite in, or download and track your boards decisions and actions and considerations. For example, over the last 3 weeks I guarantee boards and property managers have had discussions where decisions were made and they moved forward with that consideration or they said let 's hold off on that consideration right now. This document was created so that boards and property managers can have a running log of their considerations and their decisions. The log is done through the lens of four pillars. Fire and life safety, security, occupational health and safety and emergency management.
Rod: Okay. I think, Jason, I 've managed to put it on the screen so people can also see it at that same time. We see that you 've divided just exactly the categories you 've described. We see the first one is occupational health and safety and all the other ones. Just keep in mind when you 're describing it that we actually get to see it on the screen.
Jason: Yeah, absolutely. If you actually go to page 5 I 'll walk you through an example of where I find the value of this. I encourage you to book a virtual meeting with your board members and your property manager. And walk through this. Take 45 minutes and walk through each one. Here 's one of the concerns that Municipal, Federal and Provincial governments have had problems a year down the road from an incident like this. Where they 've taken a lot of good steps but it 's the tracking of that decision making hasn 't been spectacular, if you will. One of the things that I think that we can offer to the communities that manage high rise buildings is a document to track those things in case you need that information a year from now. For example, occupational health and safety compliance, common area cleaning and high area touch points. I think it 's important that you actually document, not only when you started additional cleaning, what direction did you give staff and what materials are you cleaning, including lunch areas for building staff, including I would document the date and times of these cleanings. For the simple reason is you want to make sure you 're providing evidence of actually completing some of these things. We do an awful lot in a 24 hour period. I 'm just suggesting that how do we document all this so that we can review this later on.
Rod: Okay. Did you want to try a second example? I 'm not sure if you had planned on doing that.
Jason: I do.
Rod: Okay.
Jason: Page 7. Vertical community safety. In our last webinar we had still discussions where condo boards, or some condominiums, had not shut down all of their shared amenities. I think it 's vitally important that we document whether the decision was made to close or whether the decision was made to open. But it 's also important to document why they made those decisions. Because trying to reflect on that 12 months from now, or 6 months from now, is going to be extremely difficult. This allows you to do that. That 's just another example here. By now all gyms, spas and saunas should be closed. Your playgrounds. Your exterior pools. All of that should be closed. I think it 's important to document when you close those and why you closed them. For example, you closed them because of public health guidelines or a public health recommendation. That 's very important. Another example would be page 8, again with respect to security. Here 's another consideration for the board to review. Restricted travel has already occurred with respect to the Province of Ontario 's and the City of Toronto 's declarations. What I 'm recommending is that you issue your security guards, and your building superintendent and your cleaning staff, a letter that says they come to work during this shift and they are deemed essential in my building and they have a document from the building owner that says they 're supposed to work and travel. What happens in the event that further restrictions are entailed? Our staff already have this document. It 's not an official document but at least it 's something that I can provide to officials and say, "Yup. Nope. I 'm an essential service. I 'm working at this building. I 'm travelling to this building." It 's something that building owners can do, and security service providers can do, to ensure that there 's no delays to the work staff getting to your building for your shift. That 's just one example.
Rod: That 's a good example, actually, because right now in the Ottawa area, we 've just been advised a couple of hours ago, that they would restrict movement between Ottawa and the Gatineau side, the Quebec side. A lot of managers are now trying to put together these kinds of letters because there 's a lot of movement. Your concierge or your super may live on the Quebec side, or vice versa, and so a lot of these letters are now being drafted as we speak to help for that, to facilitate the movement. Let me ask you, unless you have something else to say about the document, I would ask you specific questions that are a bit outside of the document. Anything else about the document, Jason?
Jason: I have one more on the security side of the document.
Rod: Sure.
Jason: Out of the ten property managers and boards I 've spoken to today, the good majority of them have reduced their patrols. So where the concierge would get up and do a 15 minute patrol every 4 hours, or one or two patrols a day, whatever your patrol routes are, one of the things that I 'm recommending is that the board and the property manager really focus on that security guard conducting a virtual patrol every 3 to 4 hours. It should be documented. How do I conduct a virtual patrol? I have at my disposal a console system with many CCTV cameras. I should be utilizing them to their full potential and scanning the entire area of zoom for that camera and then moving onto the next camera. Then moving onto the next camera and in about 15, 20 minutes I can actually patrol all the areas with the cameras and document that. I think that 's really vital. Especially when we 're trying to consolidate the core responsibilities of that person at that desk.
Rod: Right. These kinds of patrols that you just described, actually and this brings back to my military background, you have to do it in a very deliberate way. This is how you scrutinize the horizon when you 're looking for any movement. You 've got to do it in a very organized, and deliberate way, and always sort of the same way, to avoid skipping over a screen or whatnot. If you do things always the same way you 're less likely to miss something. Let me ask you a few questions here. Let me see if I can go back to the slides. I 'm not sure if I 'll be able to do that. Okay. Quick questions, Jason, from the National Life Safety Group. What about annual fire inspections? Do we proceed with those or how do we tackle these?
Jason: Annual inspections are required under ULC requirements S536. Quite simply, fire inspection and technician service providers have been deemed essential services across Canada. It 's understood that the fire protection inspection technicians, while they 're on site, they 're typically not engaged with residents or building occupants or employees. Unless they 're doing in suite inspections. Let me preface that just a little bit. While on site they typically have limited contact with building staff and occupants. They 're able to maintain that social distance, and those two technicians who are doing your annual inspection, typically communicate via 2-way radio. Service personnel are obviously following the public health social distancing requirements as well as they 're own employer health and safety requirements. In that CAN/ULC S536 requirement there is some language in there that says we are permitted to miss certain areas of the inspection due to not reasonably accessible. Such as inside resident 's suites and inside tenant spaces for commercial and retail buildings. Within the language it allows us to miss areas within that annual inspection deemed not reasonably accessible for a period of 2 years. That 's very, very important. When we look at what I 'm recommending, I recommend that these systems, all your systems have to be inspected as required in your building, the fire code still complies, but I am suggesting that we use that language under CAN/ULC S536 to continue with the annual inspections but delay or postpone the in suite inspections.
Rod: Okay. That 's answering one of the questions we had on line, I think from Nancy actually, so that 's good. Good timing. What about fire drills? Do we do these? And the question I hear often, and I can 't wait to hear your answer, do owners get involved in a fire drill? Do we round them up? How does that work?
Jason: Building owners are required to make sure that they run fire drills in all buildings in Canada. In Ontario, we have a requirement for high rise residential buildings, only, to hold quarterly fire drills. That requirement is for building supervisory staff only. Most buildings just have an annual fire drill requirement. They ring the bells, people get out, they familiarize their selves with the stairwells. They identify that, geez, I can handle this, I have no concerns. I get out of the building. I remain 350 feet away from the lobby and I wait to get called back in. In residential buildings in Ontario there is no requirement to do an annual fire drill with building occupants. However, there is a requirement for building supervisory staff, concierge, property manager, assistant property manager, security guard, building superintendent, to participate in quarterly fire drills. Now there 's been a lot of confusion on what 's a quarterly fire drill. Quite a number of boards, property managers, believe that the service provider comes and does my quarterly fire drill because they pull that pull station every once in a while and they ring the bells. That is not a fire drill. A fire drill in a residential high rise building is required every 3 months. What it entails quite simply is if I 'm at my 3 month period, I come in, I find out my staff that are on duty, I typically gather them around and I walk through a tabletop drill. For example, what might I ask my staff? "Hi building superintendent. Please show me where the main shut off valve is for the sprinkler system." The superintendent walks me downstairs, takes me to this room, shows me the valve. I ask him, or her, "Do you have a wrench to shut off that valve?" Superintendent goes, "Ah. Well, I knew where it was. I got to find the wrench." Good. Now I, as the building owner, document that fire drill. I had a fire drill. I asked him where the domestic water shut off was. Didn 't know it. Or knew it but didn 't know where the wrench was. I found the wrench. l bolted it up to the top of the wall in the sprinkler room so it 's readily available, moving forward, and eliminated that concern. When I document that, that 's an actual fire drill. I 'm not suggesting that you only ask them one question. But I am suggesting that 's the type of fire drills that are required for residential high rise buildings on a quarterly basis. For example, "Concierge, I want you to practice or show me where you get the verbiage to announce on the fire alarm system and the emergency voice communication system. What do you say when there 's a fire alarm?" If the concierge says, "Uhh, I don 't know. It 's posted in the sprinkler room or in the fire alarm room." "Take me there. Show me what you 're reading." That 's the kind of example of how we do a fire drill. You should not be ringing the bells. You should not. Because, unfortunately when we do that we 're desensitizing residents within the building with, yet again, another fire alarm that I 'm not supposed to do anything with. Do I believe fire drills should be continuing on a quarterly basis? Yes. Absolutely. Specifically with this heightened attention, or focus, on building safety while we 're all inside our homes.
Rod: Right, right, right. Okay. Let me switch channels because we 're running out of time, Jason, and I want to use you to the full extent of your presence here. What about gathering information pertaining to infected occupants and whether or not we should, somehow, update our PRA lists. What 's a PRA list, by the way?
Jason: A PRA list is a list required by all residential building owners to maintain at their property, that outlines a list of people who live in their building, who may require special assistance during evacuation. That could be anything from a physical, mental, whether it 's temporary or permanent. If I 've broken my leg skiing and I 'm using a cast. I am on that list. Typically the PRA list is presented to the fire department as soon as they walk into your building. They know now all the PRA 's on the floor and alarm. So if the fire alarm 's on the 10th floor I immediately get a list of the PRA 's on the 10th floor and those, from a tactical fire fighting perspective, are the priorities. Those people on that floor are the priorities. To answer your question, what do we do with those PRA lists? Again, in the checklist it says you should have that PRA list up to date because, why? We may have changes in that list, specifically because we have more people within the home. We may or may not.
Rod: What about whether they 're infected or not? Is that even a relevant consideration for the purpose of a PRA list?
Jason: I think it is a relevant question but according to right now, in the Province of Ontario, there is no direction to update the PRA list with anybody that has come down with COVID-19 or been diagnosed or is under self-quarantine. I can add one thing. There has been a public letter clarified, or issued, to the Ontario fire marshal 's office as of, I think it was this evening, that requested clarification on that. We 're hoping to hear news from that. I think that by doing that, by adding them to the PRA list, lets face it. We already have 32 floor high rise buildings with 8 PRA 's on every floor in the building. So we have to understand the drain on the fire services and the manpower to go and rescue all those PRA 's would be difficult in the event that everybody on that floor, or everybody in that building, was a PRA. The recommendation is if the fire alarm goes off, even before that, the recommendation is every building owner should be taking the 4 or 5 pages from their approved fire safety plan, and scanning them and sending to every occupant that says, follow these emergency procedures, as they have been approved by the authority having jurisdiction and recognized throughout the Province of Ontario. Once we get clarification, or if there are changes to that PRA list, at that time we can do that. But right now I don 't see it as a positive move.
Rod: Unfortunately I have to interrupt you, Jason Reid, from the National Life Safety Group. We have to call you back. Tons of questions about the PRA list right now. Tons of questions about the fire drills. Tons of questions about so we 'll have to call you back and maybe dedicate a portion of our webinar to that. But unfortunately we 've got to move on. The train keeps moving forward. Thank you very much, Jason. Now I 'm going to ask you, Denise, Denise Lash from Lash Condo, can you maybe, and I 'm only going to give you 60 seconds.
Denise: Oh. 60 seconds. Okay. I don 't want to focus on meetings but I want to say to everyone is don 't worry about your AGM 's. We have more important issues to deal with now. I realize that there 's some corporations that need to hold meetings, perhaps if they lost a quorum of the board, but please don 't rush into anything now. We expect there are going to be some changes. There was an emergency order issued by the Ontario government dealing with business corporations and not for profit corporations to allow virtual meetings. We expect that we 're going to hear the same for condominium corporations. But we don 't know how virtual meetings will work. There 's also the integration of electronic voting with virtual meetings. So all I 'm going to say right now is don 't rush into anything. There 've been questions about what 's reasonable in terms of a delay. Until we have more information to know how to do a meeting properly, virtually, or until it 's safe to do one in person, just wait.
Rod: Okay. That 's very useful. And do wait. I think right now what is clear is that in Ontario, meetings of more than 5 individuals together are not permissible. Wait it out. If it 's at all possible. More information to come on this for sure, Denise, we 're expecting that might hopefully within the week, hopefully, fingers crossed. Changing topics again because we 've got to keep moving. Systematically the questions that we keep getting are all about quarantine and self-isolation and what do you when you get a confirmed infected case? And we 're getting those now. We 're getting confirmed cases of infections in condos. Some involve employees. Some involve occupants. A lot of the questions we get focus on that. Understandably occupants are getting nervous. I 'm getting questions. The neighbour is ignoring self-quarantining. The neighbour just came back from Florida and she 's walking her dog and she 's touching door handles. So, Graeme:, can you maybe give us an update, or recap, on what does it mean? What does the Quarantine Act provide for? What are the Federal, Provincial, Municipal restrictions that we 're playing with now?
Graeme: Yeah, absolutely. It has been confusing because there 's been a lot of news lately and a lot of buzz words that keep getting passed around. We 'll start with at the Federal level. At the Federal government, what they 've done is under the Quarantine Act, they have implemented a rule that says that if you have been travelling outside of Canada, or if you 've had close contact with someone who is, or is suspected to, have the COVID-19 virus you must self-isolate for 14 days. What this means is that you have to stay at home and you have to monitor your symptoms, even if you they 're mild, they 're non-existent, you have to avoid contact with others as much as you can and you have to practice physical and social distancing in your home and in your community. For things like food, if you can order in, you should. For any other sorts of deliveries. It 's just that. Then, at the other level of government, at the Provincial level, you see different Provinces, including Ontario, declaring an official state of emergency. Under that it grants them the power to do things like, most recently, the Ontario government declared that for going forward for now, until we hear otherwise, that groups of 5 or more are now too big to be in. If someone is breaching that then there are fines that can be levied against them. What we 're seeing at a Municipal level then, when we go down the chain further, is that each municipality is tackling this in its own way. On each municipalities website you can see the number you can call if you are aware that someone isn 't respecting these social distancing rules. One bylaw enforcement officials and police are saying their preliminary goal with respect to when they get these calls, or these reports, is going to be to try and disperse any crowds that they see and try and educate people. But if it becomes more problematic then we can see fines up to $100,000.00 and even imprisonment.
Rod: Right. So what 's clear is that the police always have the power to enforce legislation, and certainly federal legislation such as the Quarantine Act. The Quarantine Act, as Graeme: just said, provides for quarantine, not self-isolation, quarantine in specific circumstances, as Graeme: just indicated. The police will be able to enforce that if required. Certainly in Ottawa it 's been confirmed, and I 'm not sure if, Denise, if you 're able to speak to it to Toronto. But certainly in Ottawa we 've been advised, that for sure, don 't call 911. Call the administrative number but the police may be able to come to assist you with respect to quarantine, not self-isolation. Not the fact that you think this person should be more circumspect in their walks. With respect to bylaw officers, certainly in Ottawa again, and what we have is what they can enforce are the Provincial regulations. As Graeme: just said, they 'll break up a party of more than 5. They 'll make sure that you 're not playing in a public park. They 'll make sure that your business is closed if it should be closed. That 's sort of for that. Denise, how do we do with non-complying owners? That 's a regular question we get. So somebody that 's either not quarantining when they should or not self-isolating when they should. How do we deal with that?
Denise: Well, I wish I had the answer. Who will do something about it and is it the corporations rule to do something about it? Using Jason 's term, to stay in our lanes, to stay in your lane. We 're not public health officials. So, as you said, if you know that somebody is not self-isolating, I had this issue with somebody who came back from New York and they were in the lobby. The manager didn 't know what to do. You can try to call public health, bylaw officers, the police, but if they don 't do anything what can you do? In this particular case the manager sent a notice to that resident, telling that resident as to what their obligations are. Other than that, they really couldn 't do anything. If public health doesn 't get involved you just have to advise the resident that they should be self-isolating and, in this case, they cooperated.
Rod: Right. A question we get often is often based on suspected sort of problems. The person is roaming and we suspect that she 's back from Florida and we think that perhaps, what is clear I think right now, is that someone that comes back from Florida, or elsewhere, and they 're not showing symptoms, and they haven 't been found or tested to be positive, these people should sort of socially distance themselves. It doesn 't mean that they can 't go out for a walk. It does not mean that they can 't walk their dogs. That 's pretty clear. One thing is self-distancing and the other thing is, if in fact, you 're infected, we 're going to deal with that differently. So the fact that the poor lady seems like she 's spending a lot of time roaming around, I keep hearing that, there 's no social police yet. To build on what Denise said, what I would do, I would react to those cases where we have a known infected person. That I 'm more concerned with that. If that was the case, we have a couple of scenarios in a minute that maybe I 'll save some of my powder for those scenarios, but I would focus on those rather than the poor man or lady that came back from Florida, and they 're walking Pistache, their dog, and you just feel that they 're lingering in the lobby or outside.
Denise: Rod, can I just jump in here. Just talking about non-compliant owners, something that has come up is non-compliant residents with other kinds of protocols. For example, we had a resident today, we have video evidence, of them being in the elevator and sneezing on the elevator keys. There was evidence that there was remnants, I 'm not going to go into further details, all over the elevator buttons. That particular resident didn 't notify anyone and they discovered it on the video. There was signage in the elevator all about appropriate protocols. Think about what you do in that case. We 're running into those kinds of issues and possible charge back for extra cleaning.
Rod: Right, right. Let 's deal maybe with a scenario. Two scenarios. And we 'll see how we apply that to this. The occupant of unit 306 advises that she 's been confirmed as having contracted the virus. She 's tested, it 's positive, she 's got the virus. What precautions should the corporation take? Should you advise the owners? Should you restrict her movement? How do you deal with that? Do you want to take the first kick at the can, Denise?
Denise: If you know that this person has COVID-19, well, first of all you want to make sure the information is correct. You want to make sure it 's not a rumor because a lot of that has been going around. So if you can confirm that it is correct what you want to do is not wait for public health. Public health may get in touch with you. That resident should be notified as to what their responsibilities are, just in case they don 't. All residents should be notified in any case but another notice should go to that resident and then perhaps public health will be in touch with the corporation. But they may not be. What you don 't want to do is wait. You want to send out notice right away to all the residents and the corporation, and the owner, advising that one of their residents has tested positive for COVID-19. Obviously you don 't want to disclose who that person is and you don 't want to disclose where they 're located.
Rod: Right, right. What we 've done in cases like this is this. The person, themselves, they come forward, they say, "I 'm infected and l 'm going to do my best. I 'm going to stay in my unit." We send a notice to the collective owners, to everybody. Now obviously we don 't identify the person. We don 't even identify the floor. But we send a notice to all the owners to advise them that there is a case in the community and we make it clear why we can 't provide more details. But we invite them to be far more careful. And we also reassure them with the precautions that we 've taken with respect to that. That 's the first letter. The second letter we send it to the individual who 's infected. We actually make it quite clear what 's expected of these individuals. We make it quite clear that in those circumstances they are not to leave the unit. They are not to roam around. They are not to go check their mail. They are not to go to the garbage chute. They are to take steps to ensure that whatever they need, deliveries, or garbage pickup, or mail delivery, or whatever it is, its up to them to ensure that that 's provide by somebody else. That 's the position we take, anyway, they 're not to go in the hallways. We make it quite clear actually. We refer them to the various sort of provisions of legislation. We want to be able to later on say, "Listen. We did everything we could, short of putting an electric ankle bracelet around them," which we would not do. Don 't get excited. But we did everything we could. We 've warned people. We 've told them to be more careful and we told this person you shall not do this. We think that on the basis of that letter, if that person was to ignore this, we would be able to enforce, the same way you enforce the breach to any rule. To us, someone that would continue to behave in such a way as to put the community in danger, that would constitute an infraction under section 117. It 's a dangerous conduct. It 's a conduct that it 's at risk of causing an injury. That 's how we would tackle it. I don 't know if the managers, how do you deal with this? I 'd also like to hear if Jason has to say something about that. But maybe managers first, Sandy or Katherine? How do you deal with a known case of infected unit 306.
Sandy: I want to step back for just a couple of moments. Good guidance at this point in time, given everything we know about the numbers of confirmed cases that we are starting to see, in multi-residential settings, everybody who is in a condominium should govern themselves in the physical distancing and all of the cleaning and sanitation, is as if you know there 's a confirmed case already in your building. What is happening now, what the guidance is, when I look at public health sites, is people who have returned from travel, people who are symptomatic, they 're not being told to go to a doctors office or a hospital. They 're asked to take a self-assessment tool and they 're asked to stay at home. Insofar as a condominium corporation can try to encourage reports so that we can act responsibly, and help somebody effectively self-isolate, I think that 's where we 'll be most effective in stemming any transmission within the community. I 'm really concerned about comments that people are making about back charging cleaning and sanitation. One of the reasons why I 'm concerned, I hear you when it comes to somebody who is acting really
Rod: Deliberately
Sandy: Egregiously. Right? So you know that you have a case of COVID. You 've been tested and diagnosed positive and you 're trying to give it to everybody by licking door knobs. Well, that 's a very different thing. Right? What I 'm really concerned about is that we encourage good behaviour. Right? We encourage care mongering instead of scare mongering. I have amazing residents in the buildings that I work with who have stepped up and put together some volunteer committees. So that they can help people effectively self-isolate. I think that 's our best way forward. People are not trying to catch COVID. Not by a long shot and I want to be able to support them insofar as we 're able.
Rod: Right. Okay. I think we 've managed to already ignore what Graeme: told us with respect to what 's self-isolation, what 's self-quarantine. I 'm confused already. Graeme:, can you just shed, quickly, some light on that.
Graeme: I think the easier way to think about it is there three levels at which the Federal government has defined what you can be doing. At the bottom, and least restrictive level, is what 's called social distancing. That 's what everybody 's doing. We 're avoiding crowds. We 're not shaking hands and we 're staying 2 meters away from everyone. We 're not going into any sort of situation where there 's people around unless it 's essential. The next level, and I think this is where a lot of the confusion comes from, is quarantining/self-isolating. That 's confusing because the Federal government has actually defined the two as one and the same. Quarantining, or self-isolating, is what you have to do if you have been travelling outside of Canada and you 've come back. This means that you have to stay in your house for 14 days and only leave if it is essential. The final level, the most restrictive, and I think paradoxically they 've named it they way they have, the final and most restrictive level is just called isolation. Which means go home immediately, don 't stop anywhere and stay there. That 's reserved for cases where someone 's been travelling abroad and they return and they have symptoms, or if they 're a confirmed positive case. So, again, the three levels are at the bottom, the least restrictive, which is what everybody is trying to do right now, is social distancing. On top of that is mandatory self-isolation/quarantine and then on top of that is isolation. I wish it had been named better. We didn 't name them but those are the terms we 're working with.
Rod: Okay. Jason Reid from National Life Safety Group, do you have anything to add to this? I 'm not sure. You 're muted? No. Wait a second.
Jason: Can you hear me now?
Rod: Yup.
Jason: I think it 's vitally important if the condo board is aware of somebody that is in self-isolation or quarantine, it doesn 't really matter to me, and you see them outside and there is a health and safety concern, I think it 's vitally important that you have to communicate that. Whether it 's confirmed or not, you 're communicating it back, and you 're advising them what a security guard, or concierge, would do about a boy playing, skateboarding, on the driveway where they 're not supposed to, where they could potentially get hurt, or hurt somebody else. I think it 's just a very simple way to approach it, yes.
Rod: Oh my goodness, I can 't believe it 's already been an hour. Let 's just dive into the next. Thank you so much, Jason. Let 's dive into the next scenario. I 'm going to change, rather than have an owner that 's infected, we 're going to deal with an employee that 's infected and whether or not that changed anything. You just found out that your valet parking employee, or one of them, came forward and said, "Listen, I was tested positive." Of course he or she is going to stay home. Are we concerned about the impact that it may have had on the community. He or she has been sitting in everybody 's cars. How do we deal with this? Denise, did you want to take the first kick at the can here?
Denise: I want to because this was a question that was posed from an attorney in Florida who actually had to deal with this. I 'm not sure what happened in the end. There were two options. One is to advise all the residents about the valet. By doing that the privacy of that individual obviously can 't be kept private. Everybody will know. That was the issue and the concern by the attorney. The other option they were looking at is looking at the video footage and seeing, over a certain period of time, who that valet came into contact with and what cars. And then they were going to wash those cars and contact the residents whose cars may have been impacted by that infected valet. There are a couple of options and I think that 's what we 're seeing here is that what is the correct answer. Forget about the privacy, perhaps, of that individual.
Rod: Right. Maybe one of the managers?
Katherine:: I think this is where some pre-planning comes into play. I 'm very grateful that those I 'm aware of with valet have stopped that service to residents in an abundance of caution in order to avoid just exactly this type of a problem or a consideration. If you were to have that situation as a property manager you 'd be consulting with your solicitor. That 's because if you were going to breach your duty and covenant of privacy to an employee, you would want to have a legal opinion before your board did that. I, again would want to make sure that we can inform our residents. Make sure they take the appropriate actions, that isn 't my point, but I also want to make sure that we 're doing it responsibly. That we aren 't inciting panic and that we are rolling with an appropriate plan for how we 're going to address it.
Rod: What about advising individuals, though, specifically? Think of what VIA Rail did a couple of weeks ago and they basically said, "Well, we had an employee. He was infected. He was last on the train on March 18. He was train 34, 46 and 65, on that date." There 's a reason for that. The reason for that is you want people to be able to self-isolate, or be more careful, because otherwise if I was on that train, I may react differently. I may take extra precaution. So how do we deal with that? Jason, did you have something to say about that when we were discussing this earlier on?
Jason: Listen, I think you have an obligation to inform everybody in the building that there may be a potential exposure. I put myself in that shoes. It allows me to sit there and say, "Geez. You know what? They used my car. Geez. Okay, they 're going to clean it. That 's nice of them. What do I need to do to make sure I can go see my grandmother later tonight? Or, maybe I don 't see my grandmother later tonight." I think the point here is by informing me, you allow me to make judgment calls because of that information. It 's not a lot of information but it 's what you know. I 'm not suggesting give away private details of the name and resident location. But I would provide an argument that if I would have known I wouldn 't have gone to see my sick grandmother. I would have stopped seeing my mother and brought her groceries. I must be afforded that information. In my view.
Rod: Right.
Denise: Rod, can I just mention we had the same issue with the super. Super who came in contact with a resident who had COVID-19. In that case, management did advise the residents that the super had been in contact. That information was not kept confidential. I mean, we 're weighing the two. Privacy versus the health and safety of the residents.
Rod: Right.
Katherine: If I can make one final comment and, again, it 's always in deference to what the public health recommendation is. At present I 'm not entirely clear on what is meant by close contact. One of the questions that was floating around in the chat, related to this issue has to do with, if you were to have a confirmed case like that, whether or not the balance of folks who worked with that superintendent, for instance, would need to self-isolate. I might recommend that you get in touch with public health so that you can get good guidance as a property manager for your staff, and so that you can understand better what the recommendation in Toronto is currently. That is if they 've had close contact that they would self-isolate and, again, I don 't know whether if they 've practiced social distancing for the last 2 weeks or more, whether that 's considered to be satisfactory or not.
Rod: Okay. Very useful. Sandy, anything to add?
Sandy: Nope. We can move on.
Rod: Wonderful. Thanks so much. Okay, so last scenario and this leads us into the sort of recurring question at the same time. It brings us closer to the conclusion of this program. This is the third scenario. The Province is asking people over the age of 70 to stay home. If you 're over 70 years old you should stay in your unit, you shouldn 't go out, you shouldn 't go to the groceries. Similarly, those who are infected, or those who have travelled recently, are told to stay home to the extent possible. How do we ensure that these people have access to what they need? Groceries, medication, mail, etcetera, and maybe part of the answer is it 's really not the corporations problem. Maybe that 's the answer. Ultimately the corporation is there to manage assets. We manage brick and mortar. How do we tackle that? Maybe I 'm going to start with Sandy. How do you tackle that?
Sandy: Sure. Neighbour to neighbour groups are a good way for condos to get around some of this. Your security don 't necessarily have the time to be going up and down and running mail and running deliveries to their residents. But neighbours who are healthy certainly can help out in that regard. In regards to picking up mail, if a resident 's gone away for a couple of weeks, they 've left their mail for 2 weeks so if they 're home and they 're in quarantine, or self-isolation for 2 weeks, they really probably don 't need their mail during that period of time either. Dog walkers are essential. For these people who are self-isolating these dog walkers do need to come into the building, and a self-isolating or quarantined person, cannot bring their dogs down so the dog walker does need to make those arrangements to go up. Those are the realities that the high rises do need to deal with.
Rod: Okay. What about deliveries, be it food, or Uber Eats or medication, or whatever it is. How do we tackle that on the grounds? I 'm not sure if it 's Sandy or Katherine that 's going to tackle this one.
Katherine: I think that was mine to take but if I 'm wrong, Sandy, let me know.
Sandy: Go ahead.
Katherine: Once again, you 've got to weigh some of the risks that are involved in what your staff and staffing levels are. You 've got an obligation to make sure that any of your staff members, whether they 're in house or contracted, can suitably protect themself. The other thing that you 're going to need to set up, if you 're going to go kind of depot style, is a way in which folks can be reminded of social distancing requirements these days. Those deliveries, however, are essential in making sure that folks can stay home and stay health. Whether it 's because they 're medically sensitive or because they are quarantined. As time goes by we might need to think about enabling all of these functions with a reduced staff. Take a look at how an owner could let somebody in through an interphone, for instance, as opposed to having a staff member who 's going to handle all of those deliveries.
Rod: Mmhmm. Mmhmm. Graeme:, maybe if you can give us the three schools of thought on deliveries. A recap on that.
Graeme: Yeah, absolutely. So, there 's a couple of different thoughts on what the most effective way to deal with deliveries right now. I think the answer is that there is no clear one size fits all answer. It 's going to be a decision that 's made at the board level depending on the circumstances of the building, in particular. On the one hand, the thought is that maybe we should have deliveries go, where possible, all the way to the units. Knock on the door and do it there. The other school of though is should deliveries just stop at the lobby door because that avoids new people coming into the building. The downside with that issue though is that at peak times, like around now when people are going to be ordering dinner, it can result in a situation where multiple people are in the lobby at the same time. To be blunt about it, I think with that, it 's just kind of how do you want to get it wrong and what measures can you put in place to make sure that you are minimizing the risk. That 's just going to depend on the circumstances of the building and what the owners are looking for.
Rod: Okay. If we somebody 's in quarantine, like real full blown lock down quarantine, Katherine, what about garbage?
Katherine: It 's something that you 're going to need to discuss with staff because you 're going to need to make sure that you 're staff members feel comfortable in how your handling or managing garbage. If it 's possible for them to leave the garbage outside in the hallway and have it picked up, and that 's something that you have the staff for, and you have the protective personal equipment for, you don 't want them, of course, travelling through the hallways and entering into the garbage chute room. The other thing that 's possible, and it 's sounds terrible, but in Toronto in particular, we lived through when we had a garbage strike. We asked people to hold on to their garbage if another arrangement couldn 't be made. We asked them to keep it in their fridge or in their freezer. I 'm not saying that that 's a great option for today. But as we start to look at the potential for having more and more diagnosed cases, and a potential for having less and less staff, I think we have to be pragmatic about the directions we 're giving to home owners. I think we have to prepare in our minds, what is going to be the safest circumstance for everybody involved. I love my communities who have really good caring networks involved and folks who are willing, at this point in time, to participate in picking up the garbage from their neighbour who leaves it outside at 10:00 in the morning because they 're walking down the hall as well. But as time goes by, and more people have diagnosed cases, you may or may not have quite the same number of willing participants. I hope we will. Canadians are amazing like that. But we need to also prepare for when we don 't have those circumstances.
Rod: Right. With respect to these volunteers. Mine concern often is if it 's organized, or supported, or advanced or condoned by the corporation, where sort of getting involved now. If there 's any risks associated with that, if anybody 's going to get infected because they were the kind soul that decided they would pick up the garbage, or whatever it is, there may be a bit of risk associated with that. In a perfect scenario you 'd take a more passive approach as a corporation. If you have neighbours that want to organize that, and they 're prepared to go help Judith in unit 306, that 's great. That 's on them and that 's fantastic and it should be encouraged. But if we sort of now become the overseer of that undertaking, if the corporation becomes the overseer, to my there 's a potential risk associated with that. You 'd want to make sure that people walk in there with their eyes wide open. You 'd want to make sure that you provide them with all sorts of information, as if we didn 't have enough of that right now, about precautions to be taken. And in some instances you may even want to consider either sort of imposing a waiver. Even if it 's just the way you set it up and you say, "Okay. If you sign up for this you accept XYZ and you 're doing it at your own risk and you understand the risk and this and that and the other. If you don 't want to play by these rules, don 't put your name on this list." That 's like the sort of self-imposed waiver. It 's at least a precaution you took. Or you may want to get a full blown waiver but that is becoming overly legalistic. I don 't know, Denise.
Denise: I 'm not sure I agree with on that one, Rod, because I have this question and our advice is you don 't want to get involved to that extent. You can sort of facilitate but by getting a waiver, what you 're saying is we may be liable, but you 're going to waive your rights to pursue any claims against us. I just want to distance the corporation from these groups.
Rod: Right. I think on that, you and I, we agree actually. That 's that the preferred approach is to have as much distance as possible between the corporation and those groups. I agree with you. I guess the waiver, or the warnings, were more if for whatever reason you do get involved. But I agree with you, Denise, that 's probably best not to be involved in it.
Denise: I 'm glad you agree with me, Rod. Thank you.
Rod: Well, that 's why you 're on the panel. Thank you so much everybody. I think this is pretty much what we had on the agenda. We sort of spilled over by nearly 15 minutes. What I 'm going to do is, I 'm going to do my usual sort of last round to see if anybody has anything to add or a topic or a question that they want to address. Or if not, just words of wisdom. So I 'm going to start by thanking Sandy Foulds of Wilson Blanchard Management. Any sort of topic you want to conclude on?
Sandy: Sure. We just need to keep stressing to our residents that they need to remain calm through these uncertain times. Stay home, practice physical distancing and if you absolutely have to go out, keep washing those hands.
Rod: Thank you. Katherine Gow for ACMO, the Association of Condo Manager of Ontario. Any parting words of wisdom?
Katherine: I have one and it has to do with two things that I think twice we may have glossed over a tiny bit. One is open houses and even realtors are not encouraging open houses any longer. A week or two ago Graeme: had mentioned that, if I 'm not mistaken it was Graeme:, there are amazing virtual tools and things of that nature that are available. That being said, I think a showing in Ontario, at least as of the recording of this particular webinar, it is considered still essential which means I don 't know that you could prevent somebody who was, by appointment, making showings of a suite possible. The second is move ins. You can 't stop somebody from moving into their property and, in particular, if they don 't have another one to live in after a certain date and time. Of all of the controlled entries into a condominium these days that might be the easiest. You 've got a clear path. You 've got an elevator that 's dedicated for that service and there 's an opportunity to clean or sanitize afterwards. That 's something that can be planned for and arranged for an organized for. One of the questions through the chat had to do with a move that involved international travel and I think the governance on that is clear. It 's not unlike the required self-isolation that Graeme: had spoken previously. Otherwise, keep calm, wash your hands, sanitize your cell phone. We 'll all get through this together and I want to thank everybody in condo land for all of their patience, all of their pragmatic tips and tools and all of their assistance to each other.
Rod: Thank you so much. I 'm glad you brought up the open houses because that was a recurring question. Now, I 'm going to turn the microphone to Denise Lash from Lash Condo Law and speaking also on behalf of CAI, Denise.
Denise: Yeah, I mean, I think this is great what you 've done, Rod. There 's so much information and there 's so many questions now on chat. We will get to them next time. Something we really didn 't talk about were visitors to condominium corporations because a lot of corporations are taking different approaches. Right now, I don 't see how corporations can restrict visitors. Social gatherings we know are 5 or more but people coming into condos, there may be a reason why somebody doesn 't want to disclose why they have someone coming to see them. It may be a mental health issue. Just be careful if you develop those procedures. As of today. Things may change tomorrow.
Rod: Right. Very good, Denise. Also for those of you who don 't know, has an amazing blog on her website, a condo blog, Lash Condo Law. If you 're looking for second favourite blog that 's the one you should pick. Graeme: MacPherson from Gowling WLG. Words of wisdom.
Graeme: I guess I 'll just say that less wise, more just kind of hopeful and thankful that I understand that this social distancing is tough. It 's been tough on everyone. I just want to say to everybody in the chat and everybody who 's here, thank you for doing all that you have been doing. We understand that this is very inconvenient and tough. But what you 're doing matters and if we just keep it up and stay strong we can hopefully contain this as much as possible.
Rod: Wonderful. Thanks so much. David Plotkin from Gowling WLG.
David: Thanks, Rod. I 'm just going to continue on the theme that I always end with on being reasonable. This is me actually taking off my condo lawyer and litigator hat because are services are often required when one or more parties choose not to be reasonable. But I think we 're now living in a very human world, situation, where we just need to do the best we can to put those petty issues, or borderline issues, to the side. Just like our courts are doing. Our courts really being stringent on only hearing the most urgent issues. I 've been keeping a look on the case law. They 're throwing out cases left and right and saying, "Come back to us in 3 months. We don 't want to hear from you. We don 't care if you think it 's urgent. It 's not." So let 's really be conscious of picking our battles and really just being reasonable as best we can.
Rod: Okay, wonderful, Jason Reid from the National life Safety Group. Thank you so much and any words of wisdom?
Jason: Yeah, listen, thank you for allowing me to be here. I think building managers deserve a huge thank you. They 're on the frontline. They deserve to be paid more. They 've been asked to do with more less. The immediate takeaway I have is the great work that you 've done and your boards. And a lot of people making decisions based on feedback from their teams, best practices, a variance of reasoning to make those decisions. I ask that you document some of them. In 6 to 12 months or 18 months, potentially you may be asked to recall some of those details or let somebody know when you did that and made that decision. I encourage you to document it. Whether it 's on our template or any template but that 's something I think is going to be a lesson learned, 12 months from now. And I 'd like you all to be prepared for it.
Rod: Crucially important piece of advice there. Thank you, Jason. Justin Tudor, Keller Engineering, words of wisdom?
Justin: Thanks for having me. Everything 's messed up with constant uncertainty and changes. So many plans that we 're seeing are based on waiting to see what tomorrow looks like and that 's entirely garbage. It 's kind of like what Denise said. Have a plan that 's based on your long term outlook and adapt it when you see what tomorrow brings but don 't want to see what tomorrow looks like. Thanks.
Rod: Thank you so very much. Okay, everybody, thanks for everybody that 's still on the line. We 've lost a few players but that 's okay. The next webinar, next week is Passover on Thursday, if I 'm not mistaken, and the celebrations on Wednesday as well. So we 're going to exceptionally reconvene on Tuesday night, April 7, at 5:00. Tuesday as opposed to Wednesday. If you 're looking for information about our next webinar you can find that. If you can go on my blog, condoadvisors.ca, we 've added a tab at the top right, webinars. There you will see the next webinar. You 'll also see how to register for it and you 'll also see past webinars. We 've finally been able to upload the first webinar. It took us a while to figure things out but we 're not uploading them. So if you missed an episode, or if you want to entertain your kids tomorrow while you 're trying to work, you can put them in front of the screen and have them become condo experts. So that 's it for me as well. I 'm going to sort of echo what everybody else said. I think those are interesting times. Fasten your seatbelts. Put your table in the upright position because it may get a little bumpy but we 're all going to come through this together. Be safe. Be healthy. Be good to one another and see you next week. Thanks very much to the panelists and to everybody at home. Thank so much. Take care.
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