MEMO TO FILE

NSCC72

2023

The prolonging of this lawsuit commenced in May 2017, based on a 2 ¼ year old Performance Audit, beggars’ belief.

Mr. Gratton and the Board of NSCC72 have perpetually blocked the execution of Cost Sharing Agreements for the second phase of NSCC72 and I cannot see any logical reason for this obstructive behaviour against the Declarant and builder (1573454 Ontario Ltd.). 
It seems that does not make any sense, as cost sharing would surely decrease NSCC72’s costs borne presently by the 35 existing units and would be spread out amongst 71 units if the extension was completed.

There must be a reason for Mr. Gratton and colleagues to take this approach, but I cannot fathom what this might be.

Furthermore, the lawsuit commenced on May 18, 2017, on alleged deficiencies discovered in Jan, Feb and March 2015.   Under the law, two years is the maximum period to commence legal proceedings, or it is Statute Barred.  Furthermore, we have emails and even a council presentation where residents observed some of the deficiencies in 2013 or probably before.

There is no doubt that the lawsuit commenced on May 18, 2017, is statute barred, and this is part of our defence. Two years have passed from when the Plaintiff knew or should have known the basis for a claim in law.

The Town of Cobourg has also raised the statute of limitations and so has Mr. McGrath on behalf of James Doubt and Mr. MacDonald. All three defendants.     

Yet this lawsuit continues, and it is very unclear to me why things are perpetually delayed, especially by the Town of Cobourg which is losing tens of thousands of dollars in property tax revenue annually. This sum grows substantially, as each year goes by, whilst the new building with 36 units is not completed. 
Why is the Town of Cobourg not pushing these issues to be resolved for the construction to commence on the westerly lot adjunct to NSCC72?

What is the advantage to the town and who is pulling the strings?

Mr. McGrath would like to see this lawsuit against his clients terminated quickly, but the plaintiff’s lawyers are obviously happy to see it continue as they need to make money for their firm to help pay rents, overhead, staff and their personal expenses such as mortgages, etc. etc.

This appears to be the classic example used all the time that… “the lawyers are the only ones that make money out of lawsuits”.

From our point of view, if we had been able to build and sell the 36 units in Phase II they would have been at much higher prices. Costs have not gone down. At this point, in time, 1573454 Ontario Ltd. had lost many millions of dollars of profit.
 
Mr. Gratton is well aware that the profits from the development came into Phase II as 1573454 had sunk large amounts of money into phase I to support the future total 71 units and not the existing 35 units in Mansions on George. 

Mr. Gratton had said this in correspondence and telephone conversations with Mr. Lee.

We also realize that with the downturn in the housing market prices it is in the best interest of NSCC72 to delay this case from going before the courts soon as, when the plaintiffs case is thrown out for being, amongst other things, statute barred, the counterclaims by 1573454 Ontario Ltd.  and Phoenix Genesis Financial Inc. will be enormous. The Plaintiffs need the housing market to improve!

We believe that NSCC72 and its lawyers are so deep into this quagmire, now, that they will prolong this case, for as long as possible, despite the ramifications to the defendants and the taxpayers of the Town of Cobourg.