Days before Christmas, Don Sampson learned he had been voted off the island — and out of his childhood home on Algonquin Island. Eviction day was scheduled for Monday. Locks would be changed, forcibly if necessary. Possessions removed. The home at 8 Omaha Ave. would then be sold by the Toronto Islands’ trust, which instructed Sampson to vacate the property in a letter dated Dec. 20. The home’s deed, in the name of Sampson’s late brother, was the matter in dispute. It can only be transferred from parent to children, or between spouses, not one sibling to another.Now, the 61-year-old marine mechanic might get a reprieve to remain in the home where he was born.The Toronto Islands Residential Community Trust Corp. — which Sampson helped to establish four decades ago with fellow residents to protect their island homeowner rights against sheriffs waving eviction notices — appears to have backed down.“The Trust will neither be evicting anyone from 8 Omaha nor changing the locks at that address on January 7, 2019,” Lorraine Filyer, Toronto Islands’ trust board chair, wrote in an email to the Star on Sunday. She did not respond to a followup email asking if the trust would — or would not — evict anyone from that home after Monday. Sampson, when told of Filyer’s statement, was skeptical.He said he received another letter from the trust on Friday that suggested “we’re going to carry on” with eviction plans. He added he hasn’t been contacted directly by the trust about dropping the eviction demand.“I would love to hear that it’s happening,” said Sampson, who hosted a “Save Our Sampsons” rally at his home on Sunday — the letters S.O.S. were drawn on signs filling the front windows.“I would like to have an email from the trust itself before I can be assured (that he can remain in the home).”And if a crew shows up to evict him?“I ...
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