It looks like the Toronto Humber Yacht Club is being shut down
City council voted to end the club’s lease, but members say they plan to fight the decision
City council has voted to end the 70-year tenancy of the Toronto Humber Yacht Club, alleging that the club has repeatedly violated its lease agreement.
Wilson DaSilva, the club’s vice-commodore, recently told CBC that the organization would take concerns seriously. “Our commitment to that club and that river and the community concerns is paramount and is fundamentally what this club is going to strive to achieve without delay,” he said.
But at yesterday’s council meeting, councillors decided not to renew the club’s lease.
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According to the Toronto Star, the list of compliance issues is lengthy, and includes encroachment on non-leased lands, unauthorized structures including patios and gazebos and holding bonfires, as well as allegations that operators and members have shown aggressive behaviour. The club’s neighbours have long complained that jet skis and boats threaten the natural habitat along the Humber River.
The Star story quotes a yacht club member who attended yesterday’s council meeting. “We do a hell of a lot more good than bad,” Chaney Morkill said, noting the club’s charity efforts and work performed to combat soil erosion.
Etobicoke-Lakeshore councillor Amber Morley, who represents the ward the yacht club is in, said 24 other clubs along the waterfront remain in good standing, and had their leases renewed.
Morkill appeared to suggest the club members would continue fighting to keep the Toronto Humber Yacht Club open. “It’s not over,” he said, though a closure notice was placed on the club’s door. “We’ll leave it at that.”
DaSilva told the Toronto Sun that the club would consider legal action. “There was a massive injustice done there at city council today, and we’re just not gonna sit down and take it. So we’re gonna fight, and we’re gonna fight really hard on this, and if we have to go legal, we’re gonna go legal,” he said.
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Carly Lewis is a journalist whose work has appeared in the New York Times and the New York Times Magazine, Vanity Fair, Wired, Interview Magazine, Pitchfork, Elle, and Maclean’s, where she is a contributing editor. Her work has been recognized by the National Magazine Awards and the Digital Publishing Awards. She reports on city life, culture—including what people do online—politics, art and crime. She received the Dave Greber Freelance Writers Award for “The Murder of Ashley Wadsworth,” an investigative feature about a Canadian teenager who was killed by a man she met on social media, published by Maclean’s.
