Vancouver housing activist Rohana Rezel has had a beef with Airbnb and the City of Vancouver for years, and a B.C. Supreme Court ruling this week means there鈥檚 no end in sight.
Rezel had made Freedom of Information requests to the city in 2019, seeking information about the hosts of short-term rentals. But the city and the company resisted, saying it could harm property owners, and make them susceptible to violence and even stalking.
British Columbia鈥檚 Information and Privacy Commissioner agreed in part, but ordered the city to release information to Rezel including 鈥渓icence numbers of individuals on the Airbnb platform, home addresses of all hosts in the City; and the licence numbers associated with those addresses.鈥�
Airbnb objected to the city releasing the information and sought a judicial review in B.C. Supreme Court last year.
This week, Justice Jasvinder Basran sided with the company, ordering the privacy commissioner to reconsider its decision, and notify hosts whose information is at stake.
For Rezel, Airbnb hosts in Vancouver are 鈥渁 select group of people to run a business in such secrecy.鈥�
He said he wanted to uncover information about short-term rentals because people should be able to know if they鈥檝e been evicted to make way for an Airbnb, and they should know if they鈥檙e living next to one.
鈥淚鈥檝e been helping a lot of people who鈥檝e been evicted to make way for Airbnb and a lot of the times people don鈥檛 even know that the reason that they have been evicted is because of Airbnb,鈥� Rezel said in an interview on Thursday.
鈥淧eople suspect that, but they have no way of knowing that for sure and they would come to me and (have) to use indirect means to figure that out.鈥�
Rezel said the City of Vancouver鈥檚 reluctance to release information about hosts and their short-term rentals makes it difficult to prove a wrongful eviction.
鈥淣ow imagine if this data was publicly available,鈥� he said. 鈥淭hen if you get an eviction notice, three months later you can look this up and you can see well, they evicted me, but then they applied for a license.鈥�
Airbnb this week won its case to have Rezel鈥檚 request reconsidered, but the activist had no involvement in the case, identified only as a 鈥淛ohn Doe Requester.鈥�
He said the company had sought costs involved in the judicial review, which he wouldn鈥檛 have been able to cover if he鈥檇 participated.
An affidavit submitted to the privacy commissioner by the city had described social media posts that were 鈥渙bscene, aggressive, and threatening鈥� toward operators of short-term rentals, to demonstrate the potential harm from releasing the information.
The judge鈥檚 decision says the privacy commissioner wrongly classified home addresses as business information rather than personal information since Airbnb hosts run home-based businesses in their principal residences.
The privacy commissioner鈥檚 finding that licence numbers 鈥渁re personal information, but principal residence addresses are not, is confounding,鈥� Basran wrote.
鈥淭he latter has a much closer connection to the personal lives and details of the hosts. (Short-term rental licence) numbers, hosts鈥� principal residence addresses, and the acknowledged ability of anyone to find the names of individual hosts, in and of itself, constitutes the disclosure of a wide range of personal information,鈥� the ruling states. 鈥淭aken cumulatively, it would enable the discovery of a treasure trove of personal information.鈥�
Rezel said he was disappointed by the ruling, which means he鈥檒l have to wait even longer to see if he can access information about short-term rentals in Vancouver in the midst of a housing crisis.
鈥淚 firmly believe that you can鈥檛 have one set of businesses that are playing by the rules and then another set of businesses that are able to operate in secrecy,鈥� he said. 鈥淚t鈥檚 almost as if it鈥檚 a two-tier system.鈥�
Airbnb did not immediately respond to a request for comment on the court ruling.
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