Twilight Zoning in Bellingham: April 2011

Wednesday, April 20, 2011

WWU Student Interest in Rental Licensing Not Flagging

Rental licensing and inspection remains a topic of substantial interest at Western Washington University where over 8,000 students plunge into Bellingham's rental market each year. This mass of renters vie with local residents for the estimated 17,000 to 18,000 rental units within the city limits. The closer to campus, the better and the less expensive, the better. That sets up a dynamic akin to a game of musical chairs but with financial implications as this demand tends to drive up prices and create an atmosphere conducive to poor conditions.

With the recent publication of a survey on rental conditions by the Viking Community Builders and Neighbors for Safe Rentals, Western Front student journalist Emma Chadband reviewed the findings and wrote an article, Rentals Get Poor Marks in Tenant Survey, that appeared on April 19th. The article is available by clicking on the image

at left.

The appearance of the article is timely in that this is the season during which most of the students are seeking housing off-campus for the next academic year. Perhaps, in some small way, the information on rental conditions will spur some students and their parents to ask hard questions about the condition of these rentals. In the long run, the most effective mechanism to ensure that rentals are safe is to have a mandatory licensing and inspection ordinance.

You can read more about the rental survey itself by reading my previous blog entry entitled Survey on Rental Conditions - "Bellingham, we have a problem". (Click here)

Sunday, April 17, 2011

Survey on Rental Conditions - "Bellingham, We Have a Problem."

"The percentage of responses indicating serious health and safety issues was disturbingly high" in some categories that described conditions in Bellingham's rental stock, according to a survey summary released this week by the Viking Community Builders (VCB) of Western Washington University*. The six month long survey; conducted by the VCB in coordination with Neighbors for Safe Rentals (NSR), a community group; ended in early April 2011. The purpose was "to determine the extent to which rental conditions...might indicate the necessity for a rental licensing and inspection ordinance." Over 500 renters took the survey and hundreds provided written comments. [You can read the executive summary of the survey by clicking here. The detailed responses to each survey question can be read by clicking here.]

Among other items, the survey asked the renters to respond to 10 questions regarding the condition of their rentals. The health and safety categories were: electrical, fire, security, plumbing, mold, heating, structure, refuse, vermin and surfaces. The following table provides the data on these categories.

Summary Table

Type of Health or Safety Problem	% of Issues Reported to Owner But Not Resolved	% of Issues Not Reported to Owner	Combined % of Renters Noting a Problem

Electrical	14%	8%	22%

Fire Safety	9%	28%	37%

Security	13%	21%	34%

Plumbing	17%	12%	29%

Mold	25%	20%	45%

Heating	24%	23%	47%

Structure	12%	14%	26%

Refuse	7%	8%	15%

Vermin	8%	8%	16%

Surfaces	17%	17%	34%

The combined total at the column to the right represents the totality of the specific problem whether the problem was reported and not acted upon or not reported at all. In either case, the health safety issue was not addressed. A comprehensive licensing and inspection program would discover and correct these potentially dangerous conditions. Additionally, there are those health and safety issues that are not recognized by either the renter or the landlord which suggests that the percentage of these problems may be even higher each category.

The fact that 64% of renters,who responded to the survey were satisfied with their rental indicates that the respondents were not taking the survey merely because they had a bad experience. Nonetheless, 28% did state that their landlord/property manager was ineffective in responding to complaints and 28% said that their landlord/property manager was simply unresponsive. Not surprisingly, a majority (65%) of those responding were students renters who number in excess of 8,000 per year in a market of over 17,000 rental units.

Hundreds of written comments on rentals were made in three categories:

1. Comments on Rentals (Click here to read these comments)

2. Comments on Not Reporting Issues (Click here to read these comments)

3. Comments on the Cost of Renting (Click here to read these comments)

The executive summary provides the following conclusion:

"Results from the rental survey suggest that many buildings would have failed inspection at the time of the survey. Many of these code violations represent an immediate threat to health or safety. Given the low number of official complaints that are made to the city, this survey indicates a substantial void between existing problems and reported problems. A “complaint based system”, as exists now, is not a solution that will bring the deficiencies into the open. Rental housing stock needs oversight and enforcement to correct substandard housing and to motivate unresponsive landlords and rental management companies to make repairs."

*Additional assistance in publicizing the survey was provided by the student club, Western Democrats of Western Washington University.

The Rationale for Rental Licensing

There is the definitive experience of cities that have already adopted rental licensing and inspections in the face of exactly the same opposition as we saw in Bellingham over the last decade. Ultimately, each of these cities was proven correct in its resolve to move ahead to protect the safety and health of the renters. We already know that the city of Pasco, WA found that 15% of the units inspected under their program had serious life/safety issues. 10% had mold problems. A full 85% had problems of varying degrees. The city of Gresham, OR performed over 1600 inspections in 2009 and issued, as a result, over 4,000 citations. Lexington, KY performed inspections of units near the University of Kentucky and found that 50% had life/safety issues. Sacramento, CA began an inspection program during which one third of the units inspected had serious safety and health issues. The question why does anyone believe that the condition of rental housing here in Bellingham does not mirror that which is found in cities that have the statistics to show that time and time again the condition of rentals in our cities is problematic? All we have had to date from those who oppose licensing are broad statements by the landlords and their paladins that are completely and utterly unsubstantiated. The Zonemaven has searched in vain for the horror stories that these opponents of licensing and inspections have predicted. On the other hand, The Zonemaven did find over 100 cities that have licensing AND inspections without the catastrophic effect for the rental markets that the landlords would have you believe. (See this blog's sidebar at bottom left for list)

One Reason Illegal Rooming Houses Do Not Work

The limit for unrelated persons at a single family home rental is three residents. Leases are signed by three people who then invite additional renters to join them to lower per capita rental rates. The perverse effect is that rental rates tend to rise under these circumstances making it difficult for single families to rent single family homes. Some local rental agencies facilitate this practice.

"To say that a family is so equivalent to a ragtag collection of college roommates as to require identical treatment in zoning decisions defies the reality of the place of the family in American society, despite any changes that institution has undergone in recent years. Only the most cynical among us would say that the American family has devolved to the point of no greater importance or consideration in governmental decision making than a group of college roommates." (Stegeman v. City of Ann Arbor)

That being said, accommodation ought to be made for protected classes, especially non-traditional unions and group houses for the disabled. These classes are laid out in federal and Washington State law.