Rental property owners air concerns about proposed rental registration program

Aug. 26—The 20 or so rental property owners and managers who attended a Meadville City Council town hall meeting Thursday brought with them plenty of skepticism regarding the proposed rental registration and licensing program that was the focus of the meeting.

The program is not needed, nearly all of the landlords told council members. The proposal also comes at the worst possible time and likely will hurt the very people it is supposedly intended to protect.

Landlord after landlord also questioned the justification that has repeatedly been offered for the proposed program.

If the program is intended to ensure basic health and safety requirements, multiple landlords asked, why wouldn't it be applied across the board — on commercial rental units and public housing, on college dormitory rooms, and even on owner-occupied residences?

The reaction of city staff members immediately after the meeting suggested that the landlords had offered a healthy dose of skepticism and that their reasons for doing so made sense.

"It would be expected that the landlords would have concerns with a program that's going to be centered on the businesses," Meadville Zoning Administrator Gary Johnson said moments after the town hall event concluded. "They raised some fair points, valid questions. The committee will go back and take a look and see what would be appropriate."

City Council's housing and economic development subcommittee has been exploring the licensing program and developing a proposal since February after council identified it as a priority at the beginning of the year.

Like Johnson, City Manager Maryann Menanno said the skepticism from landlords was to be expected.

"With anything new, there's always a level of skepticism," she said. "It's a valid thing to have."

The program outlined by Johnson at the beginning of the meeting did not immediately seem likely to provoke suspicion.

Under the proposal, all non-owner occupied residences would have to be registered with and licensed by the city. Licenses would be obtained by passing an inspection every two years.

The goal, according to Johnson's presentation, would be "to protect and promote the public health and safety of city residents by ensuring that all rental properties are inspected for and maintained at code requirements."

The cost for landlords likely would be $38 per unit per year and a third-party vendor would coordinate with landlords and tenants to conduct inspections. Each unit would be inspected every other year. Common issues are expected to be missing smoke alarms, broken windows, broken plumbing, inadequate heating, electrical hazards and other items. Johnson said the program would add only one new requirement to those already enumerated in the city's property code — a requirement for carbon monoxide detectors in units with gas-fueled appliances.

After a five-minute outline of the proposal, 13 landlords stepped up to the lectern to address the council members who remained almost entirely silent during the meeting. Only one of the landlords endorsed the idea of a licensing program.

The many criticisms started with timing. Any inspection program will bring an added cost, and that cost — which numerous speakers insisted would end up being much higher than the projected $38 fee — will be passed on to renters at a time when renters, particularly those at the lower end of the economic spectrum, can least afford it. In addition to inflation, several landlords cited remaining pandemic-related concerns and the wisdom of sending inspectors from one unit to another.

Johnson's statement that the $38 fee likely would not cover the entire cost of the program in its initial years fueled further skepticism.

"Our city has no money," said Jennifer Bryer, an owner of rental properties in the city. "The $38 isn't going to cover it, where's it going to come from? The only way to recover the money is to raise everybody in the city's taxes, so private homeowners are going to pick up the bill for this program."

Why go to the trouble of creating "another layer" of inspection and bureaucracy, several speakers asked, when the city already has a way to deal with the basic safety concerns in rental units?

Currently, the city inspects all commercial properties, including nursing homes, daycare centers, bed-and-breakfasts and college dormitories, according to Johnson. But rental units, which make up 64 percent of residences, are not systematically inspected — at least, not by the city. Landlords at the meeting said they already inspect units on their own and that requiring them to coordinate with a city inspection program would cost both time and money.

The city's inspection process for rental units is currently complaint-driven. When city officials receive a complaint from a tenant, they investigate and, if appropriate, cite the landlord for any safety violations. But, Johnson said, citing his 15 years with city government, staff members "often hear" from tenants who cite a fear of eviction as their reason for not reporting safety problems. Requiring inspections for all units would take the burden of reporting off tenants.

But — once again — landlords were skeptical, with several shaking their heads in disbelief at the idea tenants are fearful of reporting their landlords.

"Tenants are not scared of reporting," Bryer said after the meeting. Quite the contrary, sometimes it's tenants who report landlords as a form of retaliation when they are being evicted, she suggested.

If the goal of this program is ensuring health and safety, why target only rental units and not all residences, several landlords asked. "

"My tenants are not second-class citizens," Karen Kress told council.

But while tenants may not be second-class citizens, landlord after landlord cited tenants as the source of the vast majority of any safety-related issues that might be detected in inspections. One described "jars of poop" and "jugs of pee" left behind by tenants; after the meeting, another reported a closet full of dog excrement discovered in a children's bedroom after tenants with a prohibited pet had moved out.

The stricter enforcement and higher rents likely to result from an inspection program, landlords contended, will have a disproportionate affect on the poor and mentally handicapped. In one of several nightmare scenarios outlined, such people could be forced onto the streets if the proposed program is put into effect.

The one landlord who supported an inspection program was Lynn McUmber, executive director of Crawford County Mental Health Awareness Program, who criticized the negative generalization some landlords had offered of mentally handicapped tenants. McUmber said CHAPS not only operates its own rental properties, but also works with numerous other landlords in the city to place its clients in housing.

The vast majority of landlords are responsible, McUmber said, as are most tenants. But there are exceptions among both groups.

CHAPS has had the same sorts of challenges described by other landlords, she said, calling them "the challenging price we pay to be in that business."

"Our hope is that the city establishes a simple process," McUmber said. "I believe the $4 per month fee, whether paid by the property owner or the tenant, is a price worth paying for the safety of our renters in our community."

Mike Crowley can be reached at (814) 724-6370 or by email at .