The B.C. Human Rights Tribunal has dismissed a complaint by a Burnaby strata owner who accused her strata of racial discrimination because it didn't repair her unit in a timely fashion after a flood and fined her for bylaw infractions.
Chuhui Shen was the owner of a townhouse at Deerfield at 7501 Cumberland St. in East Burnaby, according to a recent tribunal ruling.
In her human rights complaint, Shen claimed the strata, its management company (DPM Strata Management Ltd.) and the strata manager, Gerardo Iglesias, treated her differently from other strata members after a flood in December 2018 that affected three units and adjacent common areas.
Shen claimed the strata and property manager didn't respond to her request for repairs in a timely manner and "favoured other units and prioritized their requests before hers," according to the ruling.
Unsatisfied with the flood repairs, Shen first complained to the province's Civil Resolution Tribunal, which deals with strata disputes, but the CRT dismissed the complaint, concluding the strata had performed "reasonable repairs."
Shen took the strata to the CRT again after it fined her $19,500 in April 2020 for breaching the strata's bylaws by signing a one-year tenancy agreement with a renter in June 2019 without getting permission from the strata council or having the tenant fill out a necessary form.
In that case the tribunal found Shen had breached the strata's bylaws but ordered the strata to reduce the fine to $6,000.
Shen had complained of strata discrimination to the Civil Resolution Tribunal, but vice-chair J. Garth Cambrey refused to resolve that claim saying it was best addressed by the Human Rights Tribunal.
But Shen's complaint to the Human Rights Tribunal was dismissed last month after tribunal member Edward Takayanagi found there was "no reasonable prospect" Shen would be able to prove her race and place of origin were factors in the strata’s or property manager’s conduct.
In his March 14 ruling, Takayanagi acknowledged racism is "often the result of subtle unconscious beliefs, biases, and prejudices" and that circumstantial evidence can support a claim of discrimination under the law.
"However, the subtlety of prejudice and the availability of inference, does not create a presumption of discrimination," Takayanagi wrote. "A complainant must point to some evidence from which it can be inferred that their race or place or origin played some role in the adverse treatment they experienced."
Takayanagi said the evidence presented to him by the strata and property manager contradicted Shen claims.
Shen had told the tribunal that members of the strata had described her as "hot headed and aggressive" and "toxic."
But Takayanagi said he was not persuaded those descriptions were connected to her race or place of origin (characteristics protected under the B.C. Human Rights Code).
"Rather, the (strata and property manager) submit, and I am persuaded that these comments merely express frustration with Ms. Shen's behaviour and attitude in the context of her ongoing strata disputes," Takayanagi said.
He said Shen's claim that her race and place of origin were factors in her treatment had "not been taken out of the realm of mere conjecture," and he dismissed her complaint without a hearing.
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