Six years after they first applied for a permit to build a new home, an Osoyoos couple has been ordered by the BC Supreme to get back to work or see it demolished.
Work on the home at Oleander Drive began shortly after Murray Randall Bloom and Kathy Lynn Bloom had begun after they first applied for the permit in 2018, according to the Supreme Court judgment issued on Sept. 11, 2024.
Since then, work has stalled at what court deemed the framing stage of the build, with things like windows and doors still uninstalled.
The town had been receiving complaints at least as early as 2022. That year was the third and last time the town extended the building permit.
Since August of that year, the Blooms have been living in a motorhome parked at the property or inside the incomplete home, despite it not having received an occupancy permit.
By August 2023, the town's council had approved seeking legal means to get the Blooms to address the unsightly property complaints and remove the motorhome from the property if they didn't apply for a new build permit by September 2023.
Just a week after that council meeting, a bylaw enforcement officer and a building inspector arrived at the property to find the motorhome still there, and a handwritten notice on the front door that stated, 香蕉视频直播淣otice: No Trespassing. No Admittance Except By Your Agreement to Our Terms of Service. Entry Constitutes Agreement."
The Blooms then followed up by sending a "Notice and Demand" to the town, rejecting the town's authority over the property in a manner similar to some freemen of the land or sovereign citizen movements.
"'Your presumption that your bylaws have any force or effect over the equitable owners of private property is incorrect and must be accompanied by contractual evidence,'" reads a portion of the Bloom's notice in the Supreme Court Judgment.
The demand further claimed that any attempt to post stop work or do not occupy notices would incur a $7,500 "cost" and that if the town wants the couple to get a building permit, the town would have to pay them $32,000.
Despite an attempt to claim that the home was a "complex building" and therefore had extra time on the building permit, Justice Anita Chan was unswayed by the Blooms and ruled in favour of the Town of Osoyoos.
The justice found that the Blooms had breached building bylaws by working without a permit, occupying the property without a permit in spite of stop work and "do not occupy" orders being posted, breaching the zoning bylaw, the good neighbour bylaw, the water bylaw and the sewer bylaw.
"In my view, there is no basis to deny the relief sought by Osoyoos," stated Justice Chan. "The response of Osoyoos to the respondents香蕉视频直播� construction has been measured. The evidence shows Osoyoos tried various means of enforcement before resorting to the court, including the issuance of stop work and do not occupy orders, retaining counsel to send demand letters, meeting with the Respondents, passing a resolution to authorize a [remedial action requirement], and shutting off the water supply."
The court gave the Blooms 30 days to bring the property into compliance with town's bylaws, and gave the town both the authority to demolish the home and to impound the motorhome if the Blooms failed to comply with the court's order.
