Vancouver short-term rental data at stake in ongoing freedom of information dispute
VANCOUVER – Vancouver affordable housing advocate Rohana Rezel says he's keeping up a six-year freedom of information fight with the City of Vancouver and Airbnb over data on short-term rental operators despite it likely being out of date.
Rezel filed two requests with the city under the Freedom of Information and the Protection of Privacy Act in 2019, seeking records about Airbnb and other short-term rental operators in Vancouver, including names, addresses and business licence numbers.
The city refused and Airbnb opposed the release, leading to years of legal wrangling involving B.C.'s Office of the Information and Privacy Commissioner, and the province's Supreme and Appeal Courts.
An adjudicator with the privacy office ruled in 2021 that the city wasn't allowed to 'refuse access' to business licence numbers and addresses of short-term rentals, but Airbnb and the city went to court claiming the office was obligated to notify 20,000 short-term rental operators to give them a chance to weigh in on the dispute.
An adjudicator's decision released Wednesday says the commissioner's office is not required to contact the thousands of owners, finding it 'would not be a fair, timely or efficient administration' of the act, and both the city and company could have raised the issue 'as early as possible but failed to do so.'
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Rezel says the information he's seeking is likely out of date now, but he plans to continue fighting for access, over the dispute that has evolved from access to housing data to a 'battle for public transparency' and corporate interests versus a citizen's right to access public information.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published May 8, 2025.
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