On July 1, 2014, The City of Winnipeg Charter will be amended. 

 

Once amended, the City must ensure that any subdivision approval of an application made by or on behalf of a developer is made subject to a condition that the developer enter into a written agreement with the school board under which the developer agrees to:

 

(a)  Convey land to the school board; or if the developer and the school board agree,

(b)  Pay money to the school board in lieu of conveying land.

 

To be considered a developer the proposed plan of subdivision will result in four or more parcels of land and be made subject to street dedication (i.e. it will have a public street).

 

In exercising its options the School Board must consider the suitability and location of the land as identified in its consultations with the council.  

 

The difficulty that I see is that council will likely require a developer to enter into either "a" or "b" with the School Board, or, obtain something in writing from the School Board stating the School Board is not interested in exercising its options; what could potentially happen, is the School Board could take money in lieu of conveying land even though they do not require the land as that money in lieu of conveying could increase funding. 

 

That being said The Public Schools Act states that such monies may only be used to acquire land for a school or to acquire school buses.

Winnipeg - Condominium units are taxes at a higher rate than single family detached homes - Why?  Is this fair?

The province appears to have take the position that the tax increase is justifiable as "market value" has removed the "inequity" and that increases in market value for condominiums means the status quo is fine.  Condominium unit owners may beg to differ.

See the latest updates on the campaign here:

http://cci-manitoba.ca/resources/property-tax-campaign/

I was recently involved in a transaction where I represented the purchaser of a parcel of land. In the normal course, the vendor’s lawyer prepared the Transfer of Land.

 

For this particular parcel, there was more than one registered owner and there was not enough room on Box 7 of the Transfer of Land for each of the registered owners to sign. The solicitor for the vendor took it upon himself to complete a Schedule which was then attached to the Transfer of Land and left Box 7 of the Transfer of Land blank. All of the registered owners signed the Schedule and the particulars of Box 7 were also replicated on that Schedule.

 

Once submitted for registration in the Winnipeg Land Titles Office, I received a call from the Winnipeg Land Titles Office that the Transfer of Land was going to be rejected. 

 

Given the large value of the parcel and the nature of the series registration, the problem Transfer of Land was submitted with (multiple Transfers of Land, a paper title, a deceased party, discharges of existing registrations, blanket mortgage in excess of $10million across residential, farm land, commercial and residential multi-family properties), the Transfer of Land was not rejected.

 

To correct the problem, the vendor's lawyer had a new Transfer of Land executed in which one of the registered owners who signed the schedule signed Box 7 and the original schedule was attached to that new Transfer of Land.

 

Therefore, when encountering a situation where there is not enough room on Box 7 of the Transfer of Land for each of the registered owners to sign, please ensure you replicate Box 7 on the approved form of Schedule and have one of the registered owners also sign Box 7.

 

The "rule" will also apply when registering a Mortgage.

In St. Charles Enterprises Ltd. et al v. The City of Winnipeg

2014 MBQB 100, the court declined to order that the St. Charles Hotel be delisted because the City failed to file a notice of historical building designation at the land titles office within the required statutory timeframe. The hotel was a validly designated building, at the request of its owner, for almost 25 years before the notice requirements came into force.

Section 157 says the City "must register" a historical building designation notice in the land titles office...within one year after the amendments came into force, for any building listed before then. The court found that the use of the word "must" in the section was meant to be directory not mandatory, and that the consequences of failure to comply should be dealt with on a case-by-case basis, looking at such factors as the nature of the non-compliance and the resulting prejudice. In this case, the court found the non-compliance was minor and did not prejudice the owner.