The owner of a ‘monster home’ in Brampton can’t build a ‘fortress-type fence’ around his property, the Ontario Municipal Board (OMB) ruled.

In a six-page document, OMB vice-chair Steven Stefanko lays out grounds for his decision rejecting Ahmed Elbasiouni’s application for an 11-foot (3.5-metre) fence that would enclose a 6,600-square-foot, unfinished structure at 443 Centre St. N.

Stefanko said allowing Elbasiouni to build such a structure “would be creating a significant adverse aesthetic impact” which he is “simply not prepared to do.”

The homeowner appeared before the OMB March 30 to appeal a Committee of Adjustment decision last year rejecting the proposed fence.

Elbasiouni argued that he needed a larger fence to ensure greater privacy and sought permission to replace the existing two-metre fence with a much larger one.

“If I were to authorize the variance in question I would indeed be authorizing a ‘fortress like’ like situation because the height relief requested is almost twice the fence height permitted,” wrote Stefanko, who based his decision partly on testimony given by neighbours that Elbasiouni’s request “is simply not in-keeping with the character of the area whatsoever.”

Neighbours turned up to the March 30 hearing hoping for a resolution to an issue that has angered them and fuelled intense debate in the city. The nearby owners reacted angrily to the prospect of having a large fence block off sunlight. The blue, two-unit house stands 10.6 metres high. Elbasiouni has been locked in legal wranglings since 2013 when the city ordered him to stop work on the structure, which at one point called for eight bedrooms, 10 bathrooms and more than 11,000 square feet of living space.

It has been more than a year since a judge upheld an earlier decision revoking a building permit issued in “error" and ordered the owner to either destroy the building or take steps to make it legal by March 16, 2016.

Since that March 2015 judgment was handed down, Elbasiouni has filed a number of applications seeking to “bring the structure into conformity” (including seeking relief to lot coverage requirement in addition to an application for a larger fence), only to have them rejected by the City.

Elbasiouni went to the OMB March 30 to argue that the rear lot line and interior side sits on too low a grade, making the existing two-metre fence ineffective.