I am not particularly in favour of buildings that have blanket “no pets” by-laws, but I am even less in favour of people who buy into buildings with by-laws that they don’t like and then try to force everyone to abide by THEIR rules.
Mediation is an obligatory precursor to a Tribunal action for people who want to run a case against other owners. By not turning up, regardless of what the majority opinion is, you could give the impression that either you don’t care or that you don’t respect the system.
The owner who wants the dog is obviously planning to go all the way to the tribunal. What you want is as many signed letters as you can get from owners saying that one of the reasons they bought into the scheme is that they didn’t want to live around pets.
That’s all they need to say – going on about barking dogs or fleas or whatever just gives the other side opportunities to pick holes in your argument.
Even a petition that said “I bought into this scheme because it doesn’t allow pets … and allowing pets would discriminate against me,” would carry a lot of weight.
Let us know how you go.
And no, you probably won’t get costs awarded against the owner unless they delay proceedings, and are otherwise obstructive.