Another side to this story
Ottawa Citizen
Your letters
Josée J. Deslongchamps
21 June 2014

This correspondence serves to correct several inaccuracies printed in the above noted Ottawa Citizen column by Hugh Adami.

Firstly, the statement that “the building’s property manager initially promised to reimburse him for being displaced” is a fallacy.

Article IX (1) of this Condominium Corporation’s Declaration states that the Condominium Corporation is responsible to carry insurance to rebuild and/or repair a unit after damages have occurred (subject to an insurance deductible amount and excluding coverage for improvements and loss of personal belongings).

The condominium’s By-law 9 further renders each unit owner responsible for the deductible portion of such repairs (in this case a $10,000 deductible, for which the unit owner is responsible).

Gregoire Pagé received a letter from the Condominium Corporation issued by me to this effect in September 2013 and further correspondences from the Condominium’s legal counsel in January 2014. Perhaps Adami neglected to review these documents prior to the printing of his article?

Secondly, with respect to the statements that “Deslongchamps abruptly quit in April”, we respectfully refer Adami to our correspondence addressed to the Board of Directors dated January 21, 2014 which was posted on the Condominium Corporation’s various bulletin boards for owners’ information until the second week of February. The correspondence clearly outlines the reasons we chose to terminate our management contract and provides for a termination notice period which exceeds our contractual obligations.

Additionally, with respect to Adami’s statement that “Deslongchamps could not be reached for comment”, we wish to confirm that we received a total of zero telephone calls, voicemail messages, emails, faxes or written correspondences from Adami prior to the printing and online publication of this column.

Adami’s column states: “A key witness if she can be found to testify….” Our contact information, including my cellphone number is available on our website, is printed in various condominium trade magazines and is publicly posted at our various other condominium sites.

We have remained in frequent contact with this condominium’s board, new property manager as well as with their administrative office staff during the transition phase between management firms, a representative of our firm even attending the Bathgate site in person on a weekly basis until June 12 to deliver misdirected mail. It is therefore puzzling that Adami remains unable to locate me to either confirm or verify the “facts” printed in his column.

Josée J. Deslongchamps, Senior Property Manager
DES Services Inc., Ottawa

It would have helped his case if Mr. Pagé asked for this verbal agreement to be put in writing or at least be assured that the board had passed a resolution in favour of this agreement at a board meeting.

Handing in receipts on a regular basis may also have helped.
—editor


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