STANDARD RECORDS CALLED FOR

Protecting home buyers from investing in a former grow-op or meth lab
depends on each municipality's records or lack thereof, say realtors
across the Fraser Valley who gathered in Langley City on Thursday.

The Township doesn't keep records of illegal drug operations found in
houses. But in Abbotsford, a grow-op would show up on the title
search, say local realtors.

In Surrey, a bylaw infraction shows up on the tax notice, but that
flag would be taken off the title once the home was brought back up
to code. In Chilliwack, a Freedom of Information request is required
for privacy concerns.

The inconsistency from community to community is the problem, says
the Fraser Valley Real Estate Board, which held the community forum
at Cascades Convention Centre.

In the end, there was a call to standardize the reporting and
remediation of properties used for illegal drug operations.

More than 100 realtors, police and bylaw officers, politicians,
firefighters and others from around the Fraser Valley and Vancouver
area came together to look at ways of stopping grow-ops and
financially penalizing those involved.

Long-time Langley realtor Wilf Driedger sat on a committee for two
years that researched the multi-jurisdictional problem. He found that
every municipality is doing something different. "Realtors want to be
part of the solution to protect the buyers," said Driedger.

Realtors are obligated to disclose all information on a home,
including if it once housed a grow-op, but if the municipality
doesn't have records, they can't help their clients, said FVREB
president Kelvin Neufeld.

"We could be much more effective if it was standardized across the
Fraser Valley. But we are not opposed to the province getting
involved with some sort of legislation," said Neufeld.

Every potential buyer should have access to a home's history, even if
the grow operation has been cleaned up and re-occupancy permits have
been issued.

"Many people buy a home and find out afterwards that they can't get
insurance on it because it still needs re-occupancy permits, etc.,"
said one realtor at the forum. "They all of a sudden have to come up
with thousands of dollars for permits and clean-up."

Realtors are hoping there will be a website they can access that will
list homes that have had illegal drug operations. It could be the
same way they access the Multiple Listing Site (MLS) for sale history
on properties.

Surrey fire chief Len Garis said that kind of disclosure could be put
on the Fire Commissioner's website and it could be made public.

"The criminal justice side has failed us. If [this disclosure] stays
in the realm of public safety, I could dump four years of history
onto the website tomorrow for the public to look at," said Garis.

The Surrey fire department was the first to shut down grow-ops using
B.C. Hydro consumption records. Since its inception in 2006, he said
there's been a 50 per cent drop in grow-ops - something the police
would never be able to do because of required judge approved warrants
and other technicalities.

Right now, organized crime will go to the communities with the weaker
rules, warned one FVVREB realtor Jorda Massey.

She'd like to see buyers have direct access to disclosure on each
home. People wouldn't be able to get away with fixing up a grow-op
home and using an out-of-town realtor to sell it.