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Stave Falls News, Pilgrim Street, Mission City, BC (2025)

10/25/2025

Expulsion Part IX – Update

What’s happened recently:

Short Answer:

Yesterday the expellees filed a notice of application (NOA) without notice asking again for alternative service by email.

Long Answer:

This is really just an update to remind myself of some procedural nuances. Unless you are really keen it is not particularly worth reading.

This is interesting to me in a number of ways:

1. The NOA is not signed so we do not know who filed it. I looked because I would like to know if legal counsel has been engaged on this file. A lawyer can take complete control of the case but that has not happened because since the Plaintiffs started the civil claim a Form 110, Notice of Change of Lawyers, would have to be filed and I do not see that in the court records. Of course, a lawyer can still be involved in an advisory capacity but they are not the “lawyer of record”. I also don’t understand why the registry would accept an unsigned document.

2. The SGCA is listed as one of the parties they would like to serve by email. On the first page of the NOA the SGCA is referred to as a third party. In everyday terms, a third party is simply someone who is not one of the main people involved in a situation, but in legal proceedings, the term refers specifically to a person who has been formally added to a case because the outcome may affect them or their responsibilities (Third Party). There is a special form which the defendants have to file to add the SGCA as a Third Party. The court records do not show that the SGCA has been added as a Third Party.

3. Also on page 1 we see it is without notice. In the Sept 23rd hearing the justice specifically ordered that: ”4. DIRECTION: Any application in this matter shall not be brought on an ex-parte basis.” The two terms are interchangeable; ex-parte means without notice. This type of application is meant for urgent applications, especially on the civil side. The Justice has essentially said in her early order that noting about the whole civil claim is urgent enough to warrant an ex-parte application. Another Justice did grant short leave which also suggests urgency or irreparable harm but that only applies to the Sept 23 application.

The NOA lays out a number of facts which amount to: on October 16th Anil promised to provide contact information for the new firm to which he had transferred the file but has not provided details. That is pretty straight forward but it does suggest that the Plaintiffs feel there is some urgency in moving forward.

10/17/2025

Expulsion Part VIII

Will the hearing scheduled for Oct 17 be heard?

Short answer:

Not tomorrow but maybe later.

Long answer:

A requisition was filed today by the defendant stating:

That the Application filed by the Plaintiffs on October 3, 2025, and scheduled for a hearing on October 17, 2025 at 9:45 a.m. at the New Westminster Law Courts, 651 Carnarvon Street, New Westminster, BC be adjourned generally, BY CONSENT, and reset to a future date that is agreeable to all parties of record.

The signatuer by the lawyer for the BOd was dated October 14, 2025

"Adjouned generally" does not mean it has gone away. It is just sitting in limbo. The applicants can requisition a new date for the hearing.

I'd love to know why but that is unlikely to become public knowledge.

Simply not filing the Application Record would have had the same result. So there must have been some discussion leading up to this.

10/16/2025

Expulsion Part VII

What does the response to civil claim say?

Short answer:

It denies all allegations made in the Notice of Civil Claim (NOCC) by the expellees,
outlines the basic facts surrounding the June 2025 indemnity motion and the September 2025 expulsion process,
states that all actions were taken in compliance with the Societies Act and the bylaws,
argues that the plaintiffs have not established any reasonable expectations or oppressive conduct,
states that the claim was brought in the wrong form (NOCC instead of petition) and
seeks dismissal of the proceeding with costs.

Long Answer:

The Response to Civil Claim (RCC) was filed yesterday by the Board of Directors and is signed by Cheltenham, Secretary for the SGCA.
It responds to the Notice of Civil Claim filed on September 19, 2025, as required within 21 days after that filing.
The fact that it is not signed by a lawyer suggests that the Directors’ liability insurance has not yet taken effect, or that the insurer has not yet appointed counsel.

Some of the main arguments repeat points already made in the earlier Response to the Notice of Application (RNOA), but there are a few new elements here:
• It expands on the legal concept of oppression, referencing several court cases to argue that the plaintiffs (the expelled members) have not demonstrated any reasonable expectations that were violated.
• It emphasizes that all meetings, notices, and decisions were conducted properly under the Societies Act and the Association’s own bylaws.
• It argues that the expulsions and indemnity motion were legitimate, democratic decisions of the membership.
• It reinforces the position that the plaintiffs used the wrong court procedure — bringing an “action” (NOCC) when such matters should be brought by “petition.”
• It concludes that the claim should be dismissed entirely, with costs awarded to the BOD.

Overall, the RCC formalizes the Board’s defence and moves the litigation from procedural skirmishes into a full defence on the merits. It also positions the Board to argue that it acted within its legal rights at every step of the process.

I find it interesting that no mention is made of the rights of the membership to determine what happens to the Society, even though earlier filings by the Board relied heavily on the fact that actions taken were in response to member initiatives — the expulsions were requisitioned and the indemnity motion was moved by a member. These were not actions initiated by the BOD. The Societies Act says it is the members, not the directors, who ultimately hold the authority to decide the Society’s future.

Now that the response has been filed, the discovery phase begins, in which each side must exchange documents and information relevant to the case. The first step is the list of documents, which must be served within 35 days.

The NOA is scheduled for hearing tomorrow, Oct 17. I was looking for the application record when I came across this filing. The Application Record (AR) is not listed on the court website which could mean it does not get scanned or that it has not been filed. Final scheduling of the hearings is usually available around 4 pm. It is my understanding that if the AR is not filed the hearing cannot be held.

10/13/2025

Expulsion Part VI

What will Friday’s hearing address?

Short Answer:

The applicants ask for 3 orders:
1. Stay their expulsion
2. Stay the indemnity motion
3. Alternative Service by email
The respondents say:
1. The application is not valid
2. Alternative Service is not necessary
3. Costs should be paid to them

Long Answer:

In previous posts you may have read that:
- 9 members of the SGCA were expelled on Sept 24, 2025
- they sued the directors (BOD) to try to prevent the meeting from happening
- a hearing was held Sept 23 but the judge refused to hear an application that had not been served and
- she said they should consider the points made by counsel for the SGCA in that hearing before coming back to court
- they are coming back to court with a new application this coming Friday Oct 17 but it is still a notice of application based on a notice of civil claim and not a petition as suggested by counsel for the SGCA that it must be to be acceptable to the court.

All that is old news but what is new is that on Friday the BOD filed their response as required 5 days prior to the hearing. It opposes granting any of the three claims and then repeated the case law which supports that the current application like the one partially hear on Sept 23 is not valid because it should start with a petition rather that a notice of civil claim. It estimates 90 minutes for the hearing whereas the applicants suggest it can be dealt with in 30 minutes.

Also new to this application is asking for alternative service. The response points out that:
“20. The Applicants rely on Rule 4-4 which provides for an alternative method of service and states as follows:
(1) If it is impracticable to serve a document by personal service or if the person to be served by personal service
(a) cannot be found after a diligent search, or
(b) is evading service of the documents,”

The applicants may have learned to ask for alternative service from their experience when I was trying to serve them with my applications to try to have the Nov. 1 2023 shutdown of the SGCA set aside. You probably don’t recall that I got an order for alternative service by email by alleging that 4 of the expellees were evading service and offering evidence of how I had tried to serve them. That is the type of evidence the response talks about when it says:
“22. In granting an order for alternative method of service, the evidence should demonstrate that the plaintiff has taken reasonable steps to locate the party and, if located, that reasonable efforts have been taken to personally serve the individual.
23. An order for alternative service is available where either it is impracticable to serve by personal service or the person to be served cannot be found after a diligent search or is evading service. The rationale underlying personal service is to ensure the recipient has notice of a proceeding.”

The response also points out that Rule 4-1 “requires parties of record to provide an email address for service if available.” The applicants may not have been aware of that rule since we can see from the last page of their application that they did not supply that or even an address for service. The last page of the response does comply with Rule 4-1 so asking for email service may be seen as a waste of the court’s time which will probably be considered a good reason for granting costs to the BOD.

The response is signed by Anil so I expect he will be in court Friday to argue the case against Beland or Cowan.

There will be more details after I attend the hearing. For now if you want to read the NOA all 7 pages are in the images.

10/06/2025

Expulsion Part V.

When will the application about expulsions be heard?

Short Answer:

October 17, 2025
The application has been reduced from 17 to 4 pages.

Long Answer:

On Sept 24 nine members were expelled from the SGCA. Their names are listed in the orders sought below.

On Sept 19 those Expellees file an application in BC Supreme Court to have the Sept 24 meeting postponed. At the hearing of that application the judge said she could not deal with the substance of the application because it had not been properly served and she suggested the application may need some changes before being brought back.

On October 3 the Expellees filed a substantially altered application which is scheduled to be heard on Oct. 17. This application now asks for:

"PART 1: ORDER(S) SOUGHT

1. A stay in the matter of the Stave Gardens Community Associations Special Resolution Meeting, held on September 24, 2025 where Colleen Beland, Gregory Cowan, Birgit Keys, Brendan Keys, Phil Cooper, Ashleigh Robinson, Ray Smith, John Cernovec and Tony Reid were expelled from the membership of the Stave Gardens Community Association. The Plaintiffs will remain members in good standing with all rights, including voting rights restored to them pending the main application being heard and the court has ruled on the matter.

2. A stay in the matter of the motion for indemnity that was adopted by members in an ordinary motion at a general meeting of the Stave Gardens Community Associations held on June 25, 2025. The matter of indemnity for the SGCA may be resolved either by order of the court pending the main application being heard or by the SGCA taking the proper steps for making bylaw amendments that includes but is not inclusive of a Special Resolution Meeting of Members.

3. an order allowing an alternative service method on the defendants. That the court allow service by email on each defendant individually or by email to the counsel for the Stave Gardens Community Association."

So basically, they are asking that the effect of the Sept 24 meeting and the June 24 meeting be cancelled pending resolution in the courts.

The application makes the argument in paragraphs 2 through 6 that there were 64 members present at the Sept 24 meeting but since there are 162 members in the SGCA there could not be a 2/3 majority vote. Paragraph 6 says:

“6. The two-thirds majority threshold has not been met and the motions for expulsion must be rejected.”

But the threshold is not the number of members present but rather the number of votes cast.

The BC Societies Act is pretty clear on this by stating in Section 1: Definitions:

“"special resolution" means any of the following:
(a) a resolution passed at a general meeting by at least 2/3 of the votes cast by the voting members, whether cast personally or by proxy;“…

So the ground under the first order is very shaky indeed.

On the second order sough they argue that the indemnity motion had to be by special resolution as per section 1.2 of the bylaws.

The June 25 meeting was a special resolution meeting and the motion passed by a 2/3 majority. I also recall being given notice that the motion would be on the agenda so I am not sure how it fails to be a special resolution The application does not give that level of detail.

Perhaps there is a technicality with the way the motion was brought forward but I am not going to spend a lot of time on that because even if the court grants that order it is a simple matter to bring back the same motion.

The Defendants now have 5 business days to respond to the application so I will be checking for those responses on Friday or Monday. They also have 21 business days from Sept 19 to respond to the notice of civil claim.

The Plaintiffs have to serve the defendants 8 business days before the hearing so the way I count it that would be today because of the Monday holiday.

Stay tuned.

10/04/2025

Expulsion Part IV

What did I get out of listening to the Hearings?

Short Answer:

Read the long answer because it’s really quite short 😊.

Long Answer

You may recall that I had to speculate about a few things in the previous post. The only way to be sure was to go and listen to the recordings of the hearings. I did that last Wednesday.
As stated earlier the Expellees had filed an application for short notice which means get into court faster that normally allowed. The hearing lasted a little over 5 minutes. Beland spoke explaining that they were up for expulsion at a meeting to be held September 24. The judge ordered a time for the application to be served on Saturday and set the hearing for the 23rd.

The hearing held September 23 ran about an hour even though that was 20 minutes beyond the normal end time for court. I learned that rather than personal service the application had been emailed to the defendants. The judge stated several times that the matter could not be heard because proper service had not occurred.

She also stated at least twice that they may want to get some legal advice and consider carefully Anil’s (lawyer for the SGCA) response to the application which included a number of other reasons why the matter could not be heard. I had speculated that the order given that there be no “without notice” applications had probably been asked for by Anil but it turns out the judge just ordered it without being asked to do so.

I had wondered why the order for costs against the Plaintiffs said “not forthwith”. I am used to hearing “in the cause” when the judge wants to delay payment until the underlying NOCC is concluded. That is what she initially ordered but then realized the SGCA was not a named party on the NOCC so she changed the wording to “not forthwith”.

So what happens next? The judge appeared to be of the opinion if the application was to come back it needed some changes so they may rework the application based on Anil’s response as the judge suggested. The Judge was very clear that proper service was required in order to have it dealt with next time it comes back.

09/25/2025

Expulsion Part III

What happened before the Expulsion Meeting?

Short Answer:

The 9 members up for expulsion filed a lawsuit against all members of the board of the SGCA and then used that action to file an application to prevent their expulsion. That application was denied.

Long Answer:

On Sept 19, 2025 the expellees filed a notice of civil claim (NOCC) claiming, among other things, they had been unfairly dealt with. You may recall that to get into court with an application you first have to have an NOCC which spells out the basic information, who is suing, who is being sued, why and what the damages are.

That same day they applied to the court for hearing on short notice which allowed them to schedule an application to be heard before the meeting which was only 5 days away. The short notice application was allowed.

On Sept 22 they filed an application to prevent their expulsion, set aside the motion passed at the June 25 meeting plus 3 other items (see the images for the complete list but those first two are spelled out as follows:

“1. Permanent Injunctive Relief preventing the expulsion from the SGCA, the Plaintiffs in this action.

2. Rescind the motion for indemnity moved and adopted by members on June 25, 2025 at a general meeting of members for the Stave Gardens Community Association.”

That application was scheduled for the next day.

Also on the 22nd the lawyer for the SGCA filed a response to the application on behalf of the SGCA arguing that an injunction could not be decided as an application but had to go through a more thorough consideration of the evidence than an application allowed for. That is my very sort interpretation of the 7-page response. See the images for more details

Unfortunately, I could not attend the hearing but the end result was that the matter was adjourned meaning they can come back to court on another day. The judge did make 6 orders which you can see in the images. Two of orders are significant:

1. Costs were awarded to the SGCA which is interesting in a number of ways. Firstly, the SGCA is not a party named in the NOCC but it is named in the application and in the response. Usually costs are awarded to the party that “wins” the day, not at all or to whoever wins the whole case. The fact that the judge awarded costs suggests that the Plaintiffs are fighting an uphill battle.

2. No application can be brought without notice. You may recall that “without notice” was a technique used extensively on the application to shut down the SGCA. I assume the lawyer was aware of that so asked for this order.

I will try to find time to listen to the recording of the hearing because I suspect the judge made some interesting comments. Unfortunately, that requires a trip into New West.

The NOCC lays out in good detail how we got to where we are so I will include a lot of images. It also spells out the reasons for the expulsion of each member while at the same time claiming that the SGCA improperly disclosed that type of detail.

It will be interesting to see how long they continue down this path without a lawyer. You may recall that 4 of these plaintiffs were also self represented when they tried to shut down the SGCA but later got legal counsel.

09/25/2025

Expulsion Part II

So how did the expulsion meeting go?

Short Answer:

All 9 members up for expulsion were voted out of the SGCA.
Colleen Beland, Greg Cowan, Birgit Keys, Brendan Keys, Phil Cooper, Ashley Robinson, Ray Smith, Tony Reid and John Cernovec are no longer members of the SGCA.

Long Answer:

Last night, Sept 24, 2025, at the Silverdale Hall A special Resolution meeting was held by the SGCA to vote on the expulsion of the above-named members. About 65 people were in attendance.

You may recall that this meeting was originally scheduled for June 25 but delayed because of threatened court action. A delay was negotiated between lawyers for the SGCA and the members facing expulsion. (see Expulsion Part I)

I have not been publishing much leading up to this meeting because this site is open to the public and I was not sure how much of the information I received as a member was publishable. That has now changed because the details of the expulsions have been spelled out in court documents which are available to anyone who care to pay to see them. I now have a lot of details which I can publish.

Leading up to this meeting there were more lawsuits filed by the Expellees. I will summarize those in the next post and then dig into some details as time permits.

09/11/2025

Defamation Action September 2025 Update

Readers may recall that on July 4, 2025 Justice Nielsen ordered that the defendants (Cardy, Davidson, Wood and Taylor) must file amended responses to the defamation action. He said that if the Plaintiffs accepted those amended responses, then the case would proceed with those responses as the position of the defendants.

They had 60 days to file. Prior to filing the defendants sent letters to the Plaintiffs (Cooper, Beland, Cowan, Birgit and Brendan Keys) requesting that the amended responses be filed “by consent”. The Plaintiffs decided to challenge the filing of the responses so on September 2, 2025 Taylor made an application to have his amended responses accepted by the court. That application is scheduled to be heard Oct. 21, 2025. Apparently Cardy and Davidson made a similar application on the same day although I could find no record of it. Wood filed a similar application on Sept. 4 also to be heard Oct. 21.

On Sept. 9 the Plaintiffs filed responses to those 3 applications.

There is a lot to digest here. For example, Taylor’s application is 41 pages long because it includes the amended response of 35 pages. Each application response from the Plaintiff is 7 pages long. The images are screen shots from the applications and responses.

After the July 4 hearing I thought it most likely that the Plaintiffs would consent to the filing of amendments because they had requested “particulars” which were to be included in the filed responses. Since that didn’t happen I read the application response to Taylor to try to figure out why they did not consent.

I am still not sure because the response to Taylor says:
“21. The Plaintiffs take no position on the Defendant Taylor's application for the relief sought in
Paragraph 1 of Part I : Order( s) Sought.”

The “relief sought” according to Taylor’s application is:
“Part 1: ORDER(S) SOUGHT
1. The Defendant Taylor be granted leave to file his amended response to civil claim in the form attached as Appendix “A”.
2. Costs of this application be payable forthwith in any event of the cause.”

So are they objecting only to the costs part which would not have been necessary if they had simply consented? I mean the application is being brought because they did not consent to the filing of the amendment.

Perhaps it is a technicality because Taylor’s response now includes more details of the filing of the 2018 bylaws including the words “Fraudulent Misrepresentation”:
“49 … (g.) that notwithstanding the facts set out at paragraphs 29 to 31 herein evidencing that there was no special resolution to have members approve of any Bylaw amendments at the November 5, 2018 AGM, or even the November 5, 2018 GM, the Plaintiff Birgit Keys on or about September 7, 2019 provided to the SGCA’s lawyer a revised version of the November 5, 2018 AGM minutes (“Fraudulent November 5, 2018 AGM Minutes with purported Special Resolution”) which contained the following fraudulent misrepresentation, in that Birgit knew it to be false or was reckless as to its truth:
RESOLVED AS A SPECIAL RESOLUTION THAT:
1. Effective as of the time at which the Society files
its Transition Application:
(a) the Constitution of the Society, as filed with the
Registrar prior to the Act coming into force, be
amended by deleting all of the provisions therein
other than the name and purposes of the Society;
(b) the Bylaws of the Society, as filed with the
Registrar prior to the Act coming into force, be
rescinded in their entirety and replaced with
the Bylaws attached hereto as Schedule "A".”

The Plaintiffs response seems to be objecting to that part of the amendments when they say:

“20. The proposed amended response to civil claim of the Defendant, Jim Taylor would add the defence of justification (truth) in paragraphs 16, 63, 70 and 77 with respect to, inter alia, allegations that the Plaintiffs engaged in dishonest acts and fraudulent misrepresentations.”

And then goes on to say:
“30. The Plaintiffs therefore are well within their rights to withhold consent to amendments that seek to justify defamatory allegations that they engaged in serious misconduct such as dishonesty and fraud.”

This will probably become clearer at the October 21 hearing so I will leave it for now.

There are two other hearings coming up:

Oct 27, 2025 – The Plaintiffs have an application in front of Justice Francis dealing with costs for the PPPA application which I reported on earlier.

October 30, 2025 – The BC Court of Appeal will hear my appeal of the Justice Ball’s decision to fine me $3,000 for my efforts to get his shutdown order set aside.

I will probably give some context to those two hearings before they happen but certainly report on the outcome of both.

There are also 3 Civil Resolution Tribunal cases pending. I will need to make an access to information request for them just to be clear on how much of that information I can legally publish.

07/06/2025

DO NOT Forget.

Community cleanup TODAY 1 to 4 pm at the school. Followed by FREE Hamburgers at 4.

07/05/2025

Defamation Action July 6 2025

As mentioned in the previous post I was in court yesterday with the SF4, Colleen and Dave Beland and the lawyer for the SF5.

The application brought by the SF5 was the one justice Francis had disallowed during the SLAPP application.

The application asked that the court order the defendants to provide details of their defense. The defendants were all self-representing and did a good job of presenting their requests for a delay of 60 to 90 days in order to submit amended responses to the notice of civil claim.

The judge ruled that they would have 60 days to submit new responses and if those responses did not contain the details requested by the plaintiffs the matter would be brought back to court. He also awarded costs of the application to the plaintiffs "in the cause". Meaning if the plaintiffs are successful in the overall suit then they will get the costs of the application also.

Next I hope to find time to analyze the threads made by the SF5 against the executive of the SGCA and in fact all members of the SGCA.

07/01/2025

Expulsions Part I

What’s happening in the SGCA?

A quick update.

Short Answer:

Members requisitioned the SGCA Board for a meeting to expel 9 members.

Board called the special resolution meeting (SRM) for June 25.

Board called a general meeting (GM) to preceded the SRM asking for a motion to authorize spending to protect the board and members against legal action.

Some of the members up for expulsion challenged the right of the board to hold both the SRM and the GM.

The SRM was postponed. The GM was held and the spending resolution was passed.

Long answer:

It ‘s a busy time of year for gardening or I would have reported earlier and in greater detail but here is what I know. Details will come in later posts as things unfold.

The B.C. Society ACT (the Act) has a provision (6-58) for members to requisition the board of a society for a meeting. This provision is intended to force a board to call a meeting even if it does not want to. Within 21 days of receiving the requisition if the board does not call the meeting the requisitionists can call the meeting and hold it without the board. The requisition must be signed by 10% or more of the members.

The Act has provisions for the expulsion of members which can be modified by the bylaws of the society. Our bylaws have a requirement that to expel a member requires a 2/3 majority vote of members present and voting at a meeting. The Act requires notice be given to members and that the members being expelled “must be given an opportunity to be heard “. The Act also requires that the notice must include “a brief statement of the reasons for the proposed expulsion”.

As I understand it the spending resolution which was passed at the GM essentially makes all assets of the SGCA available to defend and indemnify the executive and member who “by reason for their service for the organization” need support.

I have not received any notice when the SRM will be held but when that is called I expect to be able to provide more details of the expulsions.

There is a hearing on July 4 in Vancouver in the defamation case which I will report on after I have attended it.

Stave Falls News

10/25/2025

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