Twilight Zoning in Bellingham: December 2014

Sunday, December 28, 2014

Bellingham City Council Passes Rental Ordinance - Includes Mandatory Inspections

On December 15, 2014 the Bellingham City Council passed a rental ordinance that includes not only registration but mandatory inspections. The draft ordinance minus a few last minute edits by the city council can be found here.

I was not in town but through the NWCitizen editor I was able to post the following to the site regarding the passage of this law:

"One must catch one's breath!

The vote of the Bellingham City Council on Monday night [15 December] is a stunning reversal of the consensus of the council from earlier this year, at which time only a weak rental registration program was under consideration. Much of the credit for the passage of this ordinance surely goes to the Western Washington University students who have worked hard over the past 4-5 years. They spoke the truth to the opposition (the landlords) whose arguments to defeat this measure were astoundingly repudiated by the 7-0 vote. No stronger message could have been sent.

Also in for thanks are council members Jack Weiss and Michael Lilliquist who worked hard behind the scenes to shepherd this measure to passage. Dozens of Bellingham citizens also worked diligently over the last 10 years to speak to the reality of renting in Bellingham.

Based on a meeting I had several weeks ago with our new planning director, Rick Sepler, I expect we will see rapid action in putting this measure into effect. Rick seems to me to be a no-nonsense manager who will meet deadlines and develop accurate information for the council. Nevertheless, we still need to be vigilant about a process that has yet to be developed to register rentals and then begin inspections in 2015.

Again, thanks to our City Council for this measure to ensure the health and safety of the tenants in Bellingham."

Since my return to Bellingham last week, I have been reviewing the video of the discussion of this ordinance at the afternoon session of the Committee of the Whole and at the evening session of the full council at which the vote to approve was taken. I will have more comments on those council discussions and the unfolding process over the next few weeks.

Thursday, December 11, 2014

City Council Moving Rapidly on Rental Registration and Inspections

After a hearing on a draft registration-only rental ordinance and a work session on the same on 17 November, the City Council asked the city staff to prepare cost information and other data that would support an inspection component to a city ordinance on rental health and safety. Then on 24 November, the council made and passed several motions to amend the draft "registration only" proposal that had been proposed by Roxanne Murphy and approved earlier for further consideration by the full council. The first motion read "that all rental units subject to inspection be inspected once every three years provided that an exception be made for units that pass inspection or first re-inspection, whereby the inspection frequency shall be every five years." Staff was instructed to return to the council with an amended draft ordinance on 15 December. In addition, the council voted to eliminate the sunset provision (1 January 2019) in the draft before them and to add that "the rental unit associated with properties containing a detached accessory dwelling unit (ADU) or carriage house be required to be inspected as provided for in the ordinance."

These are sea changes in the approach the council had been taking with respect to rental registration and inspection. Greatly boosting the chances for the passage of a registration and inspection ordinance was the announcement by Terry Bornemann that he would now support inspection of rental units.

The only problematic portion of the ordinance is that regarding inspectors. Washington state law allows landlords to choose a private inspector. This stemmed from the Washington Supreme Courtdecision on the rental inspection ordinance (Chapter 5.78) that Pasco, WA passed in the late 1990s. Our city attorney stated at the 14 November city council meeting that Bellingham may not be able to mandate that a landlord turn over to the city the private inspector's inspection report even though RCW 59.18.125 6.e states: "If a rental property owner chooses to hire a qualified inspector other than a municipal housing code enforcement officer, and a selected unit of the rental property fails the initial inspection, both the results of the initial inspection and any certificate of inspection must be provided to the local municipality." The city attorney argues that language in the Pasco Supreme Court decision overrides that portion of the RCW.

While this is being resolved, the reliance on private inspectors raises the specter of the privatization or semi-privatization of what should be an inherently governmental function, that of health and safety of its citizens. It is not yet clear if the City Council intends to emphasize private over municipal inspectors. The council will hear more on the draft ordinance and receive a report from the Bellingham Planning Department at its 15 December meeting.

[Note: This blog entry also appeared today on the site of NWCitizen.]

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.