Veteran, family facing eviction from rural property

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This article was published 31/10/2023 (696 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

RM OF WHITEHEAD — A protracted legal battle over the development of a property west of Brandon escalated on Monday morning, with the owner saying that police and municipal officials arrived without warning to remove his home and garage.

In October 2014, the Sun reported on a dispute between Canadian Forces member Zak McDermot-Fouts’ family and the RM of Whitehead over the placement of a modular home on a 139-acre property they’d purchased earlier that year.

Despite being denied permission to install a home and get utilities hooked up by the municipal council, McDermot-Fouts and his wife said they were prepared to camp out the winter in a generator-powered trailer and fight the issue “for the next 10 years.”

In the nine years since, McDermot-Fouts said an initial fight over the building permit was dropped by the RM after he and his wife Nicole spent two and a half years getting electricity from a generator and bringing in outside water. Currently, a modular house and garage are set up on the property.

The issue of the permit was brought up again in 2019, when McDermot-Fouts said the RM threatened to bring the case to civil court but dropped it when he threatened to counter-sue.

Toward the end of last year, McDermot-Fouts said the RM escalated the matter by bringing proceedings to criminal court. According to him, a judge has yet to render a verdict in this case.

This August, he said the family received a notice from the RM stating that they had to remove the home, garage and driveway by Sept. 8 or the municipality would do it for them.

After going into the RM office and speaking to staff, McDermot-Fouts said the paperwork was served again with the notice changed to state that his property might be removed and removing the deadline. That was the last time he said he heard about the issue until this week.

On Monday morning, when driving back from Calgary with two of his kids, he said he received a call from his wife stating that police had cut the lock on the gate to his property and representatives from the RM were serving a warrant for the removal of his home and property.

He said his wife and his other two kids, who were present at the home at the time, were told that the RM had arranged three nights’ stay for them at a Brandon hotel. However, McDermot-Fouts said it was unlikely they would take up that offer.

“She’s a retired nurse who worked through the pandemic while pregnant,” McDermot-Fouts said of his wife.

“I’m an Afghan War veteran who’s currently being (medically) released from the military … I cannot believe this has actually happened, like zero notice whatsoever. They’re making all of us homeless and their response to that was just ‘well we got you three nights in a hotel in Brandon.’”

When reporters from the Sun arrived at the property just after noon, RCMP officers were present along with representatives from Prairie Bylaw Enforcement, a private company retained by several municipalities in Manitoba to enforce municipal bylaws.

Flatbed trucks were parked waiting on a nearby rural road.

The owner of Prairie Bylaw, Dave Prud’Homme, said he was executing a warrant and ordered the Sun to leave the property. An RCMP officer said Mounties were present just to keep the peace.

Whitehead Reeve Trevor Tuttosi emailed a statement to the Sun on behalf of the municipality.

“The Municipality has attempted to work with the property owners regarding ongoing by-law contraventions on their property,” the statement reads.

“The municipal by-law contraventions created safety concerns that were not remedied by the property owners. The Municipality began enforcement proceedings pursuant to The Municipal Act, The Planning Act, and the Municipality’s bylaws and policies.

“Throughout the enforcement proceedings, the property owners were provided appropriate notice and all procedures were followed. Following denial of the property owner’s appeal to Council, the Municipality took enforcement proceedings in accordance with The Municipal Act, The Planning Act, bylaws and policies, to remove the unpermitted structure. Appropriate measures were taken during the enforcement to ensure all parties involved were safe.”

The email ends with a note that the municipality will not comment further on the matter.

Asked about the alleged safety concerns, McDermot-Fouts said the RM has never identified them to him.

Because of his impending exit from the military and physical injuries he sustained over an almost 20-year career, McDermot-Fouts said it isn’t possible for him to ask for another posting and lodgings.

The property in Whitehead, where he raises a herd of approximately 50 goats, was supposed to be the job he and his wife could work on after retirement from their other careers, which his eviction puts into jeopardy.

While he said he could camp out on the property to take care of the animals, he’s not sure what his wife and children can do in the meantime.

» cslark@brandonsun.com

» X: @ColinSlark