City councillor Scott Nelson is facing some legal challenges in B.C. Supreme Court around the dissolution of a rental property partnership.
According to a petition to the B.C. Supreme Court filed on Dec. 19, 2024, Nelson and Jasvinder Kandola were in an equal rental housing partnership called Scott & Jas Rentals Ltd., which owned and operated seven different housing rental properties in both Williams Lake and Quesnel.
The company owned Sunrise Apartments at 1300 Western Avenue, King's Court at 705 Midnight Drive, Gardner Court at 267 Second Avenue North, 663 and 665 Carson Drive, 655-665 Borland Street, all in Williams Lake, as well as both 275 Boyd Street and 226 Ritson Avenue in Quesnel.
BC Assessment has valued the properties involved in the civil case at $18.24 million in total, as of 2025.
According to the court documents, the partners agreed to go their separate ways in 2017, with the properties split and separate buildings managed by Kandola and Nelson through other companies they own separately.
However, after an interim period, the legal separation of the business and an attempt to legally dissolve the partnership seems to have stalled and ended up in a petition to the court instead for enforcement of an arbitrator's decision.
The two business owners were unable to agree on a "tax efficient manner of transferring the properties out of the company and the partnership before the end of the interim management period," states Kandola's written claim.
The documents state that by March 2019, Kandola sought an arbitration for the final distribution of the properties to end the partnership and both agreed to the use of a single arbitrator to help settle the impasse.
Neither the company nor the partnership had filed tax returns since the interim division of properties in 2017, according to Kandola's petition filed in December.
In the summer of 2023, a number of hearings were held before this arbitrator to prepare the tax filings and financial statements for the company and transfer of properties and on July 23, 2023, the arbitrator issued a final award for the transfer and sale of the properties and the tax consequences of doing so.
The decision by the arbitrator arranged for the properties to be divided and required Nelson and Kandola to each make a deposit of $2 million in trust with their lawyers as security for the anticipated capital gains tax which would be owed by the company as a result.
But the petition filed with B.C. Supreme Court in December 2024 on behalf of Jasvinder Kandola requests enforcement of the arbitrator's decision after Nelson allegedly failed to deposit his $2 million.
While court documents state Kandola made the deposit to her counsel in order to move ahead with the process, according to Kandola's petition to the court, Nelson has yet to do so.
Instead, a response by Nelson filed on Jan. 1, 2025, indicates he is seeking a reduction in the deposit amount and states: "the amount currently ordered is not fair and equitable" and he disputes the valuation of some of the divided assets.
Later in the response, it states Nelson is in the process of arranging financing to make the capital gains deposit.
The parties' assertions have not been proven in court.
Nelson has served as a councillor in Williams Lake for 20 years and is a former mayor, serving three years in that role.
According to Nelson's public disclosure, Nelson now only includes the 226 Ritson Avenue property in Quesnel and 655-665 Borland Street in Williams Lake from the seven properties owned by Scott & Jas Rentals Ltd. as part of his list of properties.
These properties are two of 31 properties within the city and Cariboo Regional District listed on the public disclosure Nelson is required to file each year as an elected councillor for the city.
Both parties were contacted by the Tribune and chose not to comment publicly at this time.
