A pensioner is trying to crawl out of debt after receiving an invoice for more than $89,000 from the City of Sault Ste. Marie for the construction of a retaining wall in her backyard.
Ruth Galinis asked the municipality to oversee the construction of the wall after she was issued a property standards violation in May 2021 — triggered by a bylaw complaint lodged by one of her neighbours.
The violation was over the deteriorating condition of a pre-existing retaining wall located at the back of her Bainbridge Street property.
Galinis was given until October 2021 to fix the wall, after a follow-up inspection found that the work had not been done.
When work was completed the following year, the city ended up placing the outstanding balance of $89,024 on her property tax roll and gave her a year to pay it off.
“They had discretion of not putting this on the tax roll — and putting it on a tax roll ends up having to be paid immediately, and also incurs penalties,” said Galinis.
“Now, my house can go up for sale if I don’t pay. But at this point, I’m paying the balance.
“It’s not worth it anymore.”
Galinis says it became clear to her that the construction project was much larger than she could manage following initial discussions with the city’s building division.
The project was required to meet local conservation authority standards, which meant the homeowner would have to pay for an engineering report and obtain a permit from the Sault Ste. Marie Region Conservation Authority.
Galinis would also be required to go before city council and request that a special bylaw be passed allowing entry into the rear of her property so the work could be done, on top of getting the necessary plans and permits in place to satisfy the city’s requirements.
Despite numerous attempts to advise Galinis to contract the work on her own, the city eventually agreed — albeit reluctantly — to oversee the construction project from start to finish at the homeowner’s request.
The City of Sault Ste. Marie commissioned an architect with Design Environment Landscape to create design drawings for a new retaining wall.
Disaster Solutions DKI, a Sault-based restoration company, was hired to construct the retaining wall after a request for proposals failed to produce a single tender on the project.
After work was completed in early November 2022, Galinis suffered a serious case of sticker shock when she received an invoice from the City of Sault Ste. Marie for a staggering $89,024.66 — which was subsequently placed on her tax roll.
“When I got the bill, I was like, I don’t think this is really just or fair,” Galinis said.
The homeowner was invoiced $69,469.37 for the construction of the wall, with an additional $17,574.67 in taxes and administrative fees tacked on.
Galinis was also billed $6,250 for professional fees, along with another $1,730.63 in taxes and administrative fees.
All property standard orders that require the city to perform the work are subject to a 15-per-cent administrative fee, according to bylaw 2019-3.
In an email to SooToday, the City of Sault Ste. Marie said the location of the retaining wall and the fact that manual equipment would have to be used “created a level of complexity for the repair.”
“It had to be hand dug,” the city said in its email.
“DKI used a hydrovac truck to reduce the workload and was the only one willing to perform the work. If equipment could have been used, more bids may have come forward.
“Single sourcing is permitted under the city’s purchasing policy once no bids are received.”
While Galinis has knocked that amount down to $36,400 with the help of one lump sum payment, a penalty of 1.25 per cent charged on the outstanding amount each month increased her balance to almost $49,000.
She recently paid more than $7,400 to cover the monetary penalties after putting down nearly $7,800 the week prior, with plans to secure a bank loan for the remaining balance owing to the city.
Galinis has reached out to both the city’s chief administrative officer and the mayor in the past, asking to have the outstanding balanced reduced in some way, to no avail.
But here’s where it gets worse.
Her legal counsel has been advised that Galinis is now on the cusp of being slapped with a tax arrears certificate against her Bainbridge Street property — a move that could make her home of nearly two decades liable for tax sale proceedings.
The city says there is a 365-day redemption period once a tax arrears certificate is registered on title, and that a property would not be offered for a tax sale until the redemption period has ended.
Galinis firmly believes that it didn’t have to come down to this.
“They could reduce the administrative fees if the city wanted to. Could they have done more about not putting it on the tax roll? Yeah, they could’ve done that. Did they do it? No,” she said.
“It’s not that they’re doing anything illegal, they’re following procedure — but there’s other ways of doing things, and they’re not bothering.”
The city doesn’t see it that way, contending that city staff spent an “extensive amount of time,” with Galinis across multiple departments, trying to assist her while providing “best advice to remedy her situation.”
“Unfortunately, she consistently would not take it, nor would she rectify her property issue,” the city told SooToday via email.
“She then told the city to take care of the matter for her, and the city made its best efforts to address the situation despite recommending she handle the matter on her own from the outset of discussions.
“Media is simply the latest step in her campaign to have someone continue to fix a situation that she chose for herself.”
Galinis says she ultimately wanted to go public with her cautionary tale of "undue hardship" in an effort to warn others.
“God forbid anyone else gets in this situation,” she said.