Developer owns troubled building
What will Denis Vranich do with Dundurn eyesore that cost $1.5 million?
Steve Arnold and Lisa Grace Marr
The Hamilton Spectator
(Oct 2, 2007)
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Denis Vranich is the latest owner of 220 Dundurn St. -- a sorry four-acre plot of land with a large building that has at times acted as a hosiery factory, school board storage facility and flophouse.
Land registry records show Vranich purchased the site Jan. 31 for $1.5 million under the name 220 Dundurn St. Inc.
The building on the site has been plagued with problems that have intensified since 2004 when its third-floor caught fire under then-suspicious circumstances. In 2005, under the ownership of a numbered company in Thornhill, the city had dozens of calls a week from residents complaining about the derelict state of the building.
Brian McHattie, Ward 1 councillor, said the plot at the corner of Chatham and Dundurn streets has been at the top of his priority list since he was elected four years ago.
"It is one of the great frustrations in the city how these abandoned buildings can bring down neighbourhoods," he said.
McHattie said he met with Vranich twice since he purchased the property and while there were no definite plans discussed, Vranich indicated he hoped to submit building plans to the city by the end of November.
"I'm not getting too excited except I'll give him a call about it at that time."
McHattie said the city has received two property standard complaints since Vranich purchased the property.
"We've sent over cleanup crews and just added it to his tax bill -- just what we've done with previous owners."
Paul Buckle, acting co-ordinator of the municipal law enforcement division, said two orders to clear up the property and a third to secure it against trespassers have been issued. The boarding up of windows was done by a city contractor. The status of the cleanup work remains uncertain, but Buckle said if work is being done at the property now, it is likely ordered by Vranich.
Vranich did not return phone calls from The Hamilton Spectator. His father, developer Darko Vranich, refused to comment.
Since 1998, the building has been through five owners -- the Hamilton-Wentworth District School Board sold it for $400,000 to a company called Dundurn Street Loffts Inc. which planned to turn it into loft apartments. A year after the purchase Dundurn Loffts gave a $1.5 million mortgage to Mississauga-based Retrocom Growth Fund Inc. Retrocom took possession of the property under power of sale in 2003 and sold it to 1574296 Ontario Inc., of Thornhill, for $2 million. The numbered company then sold it this year to Vranich for $1.5 million.
Neighbour Mark Powell, was delighted by the chance something might finally happen with a building which has been a blight on the neighbourhood for years. "If we can do anything to expedite something happening there I'm sure the whole community will get behind it," he said.
Ward 2 Councillor Bob Bratina said it was his understanding that Denis has a business separate from his father.
But Bratina said that both father and son don't "just sit on properties, (they) do things with them."
Darko Vranich owns the former Hamilton Motor Products (HMP) building on Bay Street and is proposing a 120-room Hilton Homewood Suites Hotel at that site. He is also behind plans for a 100-room Holiday Inn Express at King and Queen streets and a 60-room Days Inn at Main and Spring streets.
[b]Bratina said Darko Vranich told him he intends to submit plans to the city's building department in October, which will have details about the Hilton hotel complex.
"He's had to change his plans for the (HMP) building at the behest of the heritage committee," said Bratina.[/b]
Darko Vranich, with partner Steve Pocrnic, is also behind a plan to transform ratty buildings on Main Street West, Hess Street South and Queen Street South into modern loft-office combinations, while Denis Vranich and partner John Bukovac are behind plans for a $30-million hotel-office project at Golf Links and Stone Church roads in Ancaster's Meadowlands.
Denis Vranich, 31, pleaded guilty in court in September to sexually assaulting a female bartender at a Hess Street business where he is property owner and manager. He is to be sentenced Oct. 30.
He is not the first owner of the Dundurn Street building to find himself in court -- in 2005 Dundurn Loffts owner Adam J. Stelmaszynski of Brantford and two of his companies were convicted of four charges under the federal Excise Tax Act in a Brantford court.
DC8310-31-2007, 02:12 AM
Denis Vranich sentenced to house arrest for attack
October 30, 2007
BY BARBARA BROWN
The Hamilton Spectator
A Hess Village businessman who sexually assaulted a female bartender will serve a year under house arrest.
He’s also barred from entering the village without the written permission of his conditional sentence supervisor.
Denis Vranich, 31, was ordered by Ontario Court Justice Bernd Zabel to wear an electronic-monitoring bracelet on his ankle while serving his conditional sentence. The 12-month term will be followed by a further year of reporting to a probation officer.
Vranich, who owns the property and manages the Elixir Lounge and Nightclub, pleaded guilty last month to sexually assaulting a 22-year-old staff member. He admitted to cornering and attacking the woman on the night of July 20, 2006, while she was bartending at a private, after-hours party.
The Ancaster man, who is involved in several property development projects around the city, made two separate appearances at the John Sopinka Courthouse yesterday. Earlier, he was found guilty of impaired driving and refusing a breathalyser demand by police.
Those charges arose on Aug. 11, 2006, after Vranich crashed a Porsche into a ditch while exiting the King Street West ramp to Highway 403. The sports car was destroyed and Vranich was dazed but not seriously injured.
This was Vranich’s first drinking-and-driving conviction, although he has 31 prior convictions under the Highway Traffic Act. “It’s certainly an atrocious driving record,? said Ontario Court Justice Don Cooper, who handed Vranich $1,600 in fines and suspended his licence for 18 months.
Under the terms of his conditional sentence and probation order for the sexual assault, Vranich is prohibited from consuming alcohol for two years.
Assistant Crown attorney Stan Dudzic told court at Vranich’s guilty plea last month that on the night the bartender was assaulted, she was dressed in a corset, garter belt and stockings in keeping with management’s “lingerie night? theme.
He said Vranich grabbed the woman, pulled down her bodice, groped her breasts and penetrated her with his finger.
The convicted man, the son of well-known property developer Darko Vranich, will have his name on the national sex offender registry for 10 years and a sample of his blood will be analyzed and submitted to Canada’s national criminal database.
The victim told Judge Zabel she felt defiled and humiliated after the assault.
“The thought of him makes me absolutely nauseous and brings on panic attacks,? she said in a victim impact statement.
“When I go anywhere and someone I used to work with is there, I leave immediately because I feel humiliated.?
The recommendation of the Crown and defence lawyer Dean Paquette for a period of house arrest caused a public outcry when it was reported in The Spectator last month.
Hamilton resident Crystal Stevens started a petition on Facebook to protest the proposed sentence.
She collected close to 1,700 names before the social networking website received a complaint and shut the group down.
Approximately 20 people, including Stevens and Lenore Lukasik-Foss, director of Hamilton’s Sexual Assault Centre, joined a walk on Saturday from the downtown courthouse to Hess Village to protest the sentence.
“If you’re being placed on the national sex offender registry, you should be spending some time in jail,? said Stevens.
In January 2001, Vranich was ordered to pay more than $85,000 in fines and surcharges after being convicted on three counts of prostitution-related offences and three charges of falsifying immigration records.
The charges were laid in 1999 following a joint police task force investigation into complaints that young Hungarian women were being lured to this country with the prospect of lucrative jobs as exotic dancers.
The section of the Criminal Code under which Vranich was convicted in 2001 refers to procuring persons under the age of 18 and exercising control over them to engage in prostitution.
