As part of a series, the Star is answering common questions about renting in Toronto. Do you have questions that you want us to answer? Email the Star at renterFAQ@thestar.ca.

The question:

It’s three weeks until the election and you’ve picked your candidate and want to show the world, or at least your neighbours, by putting up a political campaign sign.

Your landlord, however, doesn’t share your leaning and wants to put up a different sign, or perhaps bar you from putting up a sign at all.

What are the rules around election signs in rental units?

The answer:

Elections Canada, per the Canada Elections Act, states property owners do not have the right to prevent tenants from placing a campaign sign on the property they are leasing. Similarly, condo owners may put up election signs on or in their unit, within a set of “parameters” defined in section 322.

Municipal law concludes a sign can be displayed on private property and fences if the campaign team receives consent from the “owner/occupant of the property,” but doesn’t distinguish between the owner of a property and tenants.

Houses

Caryma Sa’d, Toronto landlord and tenant lawyer, said it really depends on a number of factors and the law doesn’t fully cover essential elements of specific cases.

If a tenant is occupying the basement of a house, with their landlord living above them, Sa’d said there may be an argument for the landlord to deny the tenant’s right to erect a sign on their shared lawn. Another option would be for both tenants to place the sign of their choosing on the property if there is enough space to do so.

Further, if several tenants share a house and one tenant wishes to place a sign on the front lawn, it may carve into the boundaries of another’s comfort zone, voiding the right to place a sign on the rented property.

A landlord can ask their tenant to take it down, but only if there is a solid basis for doing so. It’s an issue that could be brought to the Landlord and Tenant Board, but not one that Sa’d said she has seen as of yet.

“It’s not a situation where you would ask for permission. I would say you would go for it and then if the landlord has an issue, they could raise it with you in the appropriate way,” she said, noting that this type of issue may be solved at a tenant-landlord level, rather than bringing it to the board.

Carolina Anna Rego, legal worker for Landlord’s Self-Help Centre, said it may be best for landlords and tenants to both place a sign on the property if they have different political stances and wish to do so. “However, if only the tenant is living at the rental unit, they should feel free to allow the sign of the political party of their choice.

“Issues may also arise when it is a fully tenanted duplex, for example, and both tenants have different party choices. In this case as well they should both be able to have the sign for the candidate of their choice.”

Condos

The rules for condominiums are the most stringent for tenants.

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Linda Pinizzotto, the founder and president of Condo Owners Association Ontario — and a veteran realtor with Sutton Group Quantum Realty Inc. — told the Star that signs can “absolutely not” be affixed to balconies, doors or windows, because they are “common elements,” which belong to corporations, not condo owners. As a result, tenants could — if they really wanted to — put up a sign in the interior of the home, but cannot put them on anything owned by the corporation.

Pinizzotto also said she would be “very surprised” if the corporations who owned the condos allowed any sign on “common elements,” meaning balconies, windows, exterior doors, or anything else owned by the condo corporation and not the tenant.

Pamela Simons, a spokesperson from Re/max Condos Plus Corp. Brokerage, agrees with Pinizzotto and said that condominiums generally do not allow individual unitholders to put signs on their windows, etc.

According to Elections Canada, during a federal election, the Canada Elections Act allows condo owners to display election advertising posters on the premises of their unit but allows condo corporations to set reasonable conditions with respect to the size or type of election advertising posters that may be displayed. The act also permits condo corporations to choose to prohibit the display of election advertising posters in common areas of a building.

As well, the Elections Canada Act defines “common areas” as areas that may be used by all occupants of, and visitors to, a building but does not apply to areas that are part of the premises of the unit and not accessible to other building residents, such as balconies.

Although politicians are allowed to canvas the building — the Residential Tenancies Act states that landlords cannot restrict reasonable access to a residence by canvassing municipal, provincial or federal candidates or their representatives — and drop off individual material, the tenants aren’t allowed to put any political signage on the windows, Simons said.

What happens if the tenants do it anyway?

Pamela says the resident of the house would be informed and asked to take it down, after which the owner would be informed as well.

“It is the renter who is breaking the rules, but also the owner that’s responsible for kind of supervising the rules,” Simons said. “So they would report first to the residents to take it down, and if they didn’t then they would report it to the condominium owners who would be responsible for enforcing the condo rules.”

With files from Ted Fraser, Jacob Lorinc and Osobe Waberi

Clarification - Oct. 10, 2019: This article was edited from a previous version to clarify that according to Elections Canada, federal election legislation permits condo condo owners to display election signs on the premises of their own units, including balconies.

David Venn is a breaking news reporter, working out of the Star’s radio room in Toronto. Follow him on Twitter: @davidvenn_