Privacy Breaching

Just over a year ago I was planning a trip south so that I could avoid the painful affects of Seasonal Affective Disorder. I had spent quite a bit of time preparing my vehicle to drive into the unknown to counter the negative affects of the "dark season". As I needed to prevent any problems with my housing situation, my doctor so graciously prepared a letter of support. I dropped this off to BC Housing as the funding and rules associated with subsidized housing were established by BC Housing. I was debating how to approach my landlord and deliver the letter.

On a day I was feeling rather unwell, I decided to catch-up on my laundry. As I was doing my laundry, my landlord entered and started a discussion. At first I couldn't figure out what the landlord was talking about but I started realizing through the discussion that my landlord knew quite a bit about my planned trip. I wasn't sure if it was the gossip mill that had informed my landlord or what. My landlord stated they had received the letter from BC Housing. I was informed by the landlord that BC Housing had faxed the letter containing confidential health information to my landlord without my knowledge or approval. I hadn't been given the chance to figure out how to deal with it. I was being confronted by my landlord about a private matter in a public space and I had no way of controlling this breach or the manner it was being addressed. My landlord also stated that they had contacted my doctor to discuss the matter. I don't blame the doctor as the letter did state, "feel free to contact me." The doctor presumed I had given the letter to my landlord and that I have a normal landlord.

It became abundantly clear that BC Housing did not respect my privacy and neither did my landlord. At first I ignored this as a possible anomaly but with additional breaches of my privacy, it appears to be "the norm" with my landlord. Under PIPA (Personal Information Protection Act [SBC 2003] CHAPTER 63)
Part 9 — Care of Personal Information

Protection of personal information

34  An organization must protect personal information in its custody or under its control by making reasonable security arrangements to prevent unauthorized access, collection, use, disclosure, copying, modification or disposal or similar risks.

This particular situation was a significant breach by BC Housing and my landlord. There also seems to be multiple breaches between the landlord and "preferred tenants" as many of the "in the know" tenants seem to know far too much about vulnerable tenants than they should. The whole purpose behind PIPA is to ensure an individual has control over their personal information. Once this is breached, it is a free-for-all.

I often wonder about the emails I get from my landlord. Not at any time did I approve or were asked if I'd like to be added to the distribution list. In addition, several emails expose my email address to all of the tenants where I live. Did anyone think to check PIPA for email related issues? Nope. How do you tease an ostracized and excluded tenant from the community? Send them emails about activities that they're not allowed to participate in that you know they'd be interested in. I'm not biting. They call that "bait and hook" and it is childish.

Last year, during a bout of bullying by the mob, the landlord joined in and used BC Housing subsidy applications to bully. On the third application I asked my parents to drop off the application as I did not feel comfortable looking in the eyes of liars. Much to my amazement, the landlord pulled my parents into a meeting that I neither authorized or knew was going to happen to discuss me. The first thing my landlord said to my parents, “We know (tenant) has mental health issues and we have been very accommodating towards him.” Wow Nelly! Now there's a Human Rights violation if I've ever heard one. I am familiar with bullies discrediting the target as "mentally ill", but to the target's parents? On an unauthorized meeting? Talk about breach-o-rama! In addition to all of this, a board member of the housing complex followed my mother down the back lane a block from the complex to the car where I sat. When I pointed this out to my mother the individual scurried off like a rat.

Privacy is important to ensure fair and honest treatment and to ensure accountability. Unfortunately, when there is little regard for privacy there is no trust.

The New Sheriff In Town

Quite a few years ago a community gathering was held with the, then, new landlord. A variety of community members were in attendance including a friend and neighbour. My friend observed the new landlord making inappropriate sexual advances on one of the tenants. She approached the new landlord and adviced him to back-down. The new landlord's reply, "I'm the New Sheriff in Town!" From this point forward my friend and neighbour was a target for relentless bullying. Luckily, it was determined that this individual had a white-collar crime history, demonstrated in a Canadian law database, to which I brought up and a hasty departure, "due to health reasons". It was amusing to watch the budget change from healthy to not so good in such a short time. I realize I am bullied because I am a whistleblower.

 In the complex I live in, I have a friend who I've known for a number of years. One day I visited him to say hello. He was crying that he had to return his box heater outlined in a letter from the landlord. "What's wrong? Don't your heaters work?", I said. "No", was his reply and his apartment was quite cold. "How long has it been like this?", I asked. "A year". I looked at his heater and, sure enough, it wasn't working. I decided to check the heaters in the cold hallways and they were also not working. The entire building had been without heat for an entire year. I understood why the tenants had not spoken up as they are either all or almost all BC Housing subsidized tenants. They were concerned about losing their home if they speak-up so either you live in cold and keep your home or speak up, get heat and lose your home. Being a subsidized tenant myself, I phoned the office and advised them that there was no heat in the building. I guess that's one of the reasons I'm a target. Kind of an "unheated" topic.

This same friend asked me a few weeks ago if he should go to the police as the landlord has relentlessly accused him of being a drug dealer. How do you prove a negative? Having known this fellow for a number of years I am fully aware he is not a drug dealer. He is, though, a social person and has many friends. Culturally speaking, english is not his first language and his ethnic cultural background, which is Latin American, is social in nature. So, if you have a number of friends, you are labelled a "drug dealer". I think back to the Citizenship ceremony of another friend and the Citizenship judge discussing the importance of respecting different cultural backgrounds as a Canadian value. One could easily say that the landlord is encouraging and participating in discrimination based on ethnicity. By mentioning this, I am concerned he may lose his housing.

In a society that encourages "Have" over "Have-Nots", the differences in rights, dignity and respect granted to the "Have-Nots" diminish with each passing moment. As a prime example, the housing complex I live in has BC Housing "subsidized housing" and "market-rate" housing, which really isn't "market" as it is also subsidized. Over a number of years the "market-rate" tenants have become the "Have" and the "subsidized tenants" are the "Have-Nots". The market-rate tenants enjoy quick repair services, regular maintenance, access to all amenities and services, power influence of the landlord and society board of directors, dignity and respect. The subsidized housing tenants are subject to less building maintenance, limited access to amenities and services, little to no respect and dignity and discrimination. A market-rate tenant who possesses a great deal of power and has been a stalker and bully towards me once expressed that the subsidized housing was only meant as "temporary housing". I liken the situation to classism based on socio-economic position in housing.

It is without question that writing about this issue will result in my eviction. It is my fundamental freedoms of conscience, thought, and expression, amongst others, that I exercise according to the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms that I write this blog.