Seeing as rental property reform is a community building proposition, who could possibly be opposed?

If you’re just tuning in …

On Monday and Tuesday, NA Confidential considered the concept of rental property reform (and inspection) in New Albany. A healthy discussion has ensued, and it continues.

Reader Brandon Smith, a forceful advocate of such matters, commented yesterday:

You probably recall that I have posted many times on this and other blogs about the need for a comprehensive rethinking and restructuring of how we enforce ordinances and have suggested avenues for doing so. I'm puzzled as to why rental inspection and enforcement are becoming issues on NAC all of the sudden, but I'm glad they are.

Of course, topics like ordinance enforcement and rental inspection have surfaced continuously on this blog since its inception.

The understandable reason for this is that the more one looks into the root cause of New Albany’s decades-long malaise, as expressed by homeowners at neighborhood association meetings, uttered in barroom conversations and accepted without question by virtually every resident of the city, the more it becomes apparent that a long-festering culture of non-enforcement and unaccountability threatens any and all efforts to make the city a better place for everyone living in it.

Most prominently, without proper regulation and inspection, the proliferation of rental properties – most prominently but not exclusively those within the realm of absentee ownership – is ruinous and is inimical to almost every effort to improve the quality of the city’s neighborhoods.

The evidence is not purely apocryphal, because reams of evidence exists to support this thesis.

Generations of civic leaders have cynically tolerated and openly accepted – perhaps even encouraged – this unregulated rental property situation, and as a result, a culture of unaccountability has enveloped neighborhoods to the detriment of owner and renter alike.

There is no better example of the sort of “managed decay” advocated in the breach by elected officials like Steve “We Can’t” Price than unregulated clusters of rental properties owned and managed by people who do not live in them, will not care for them, and consider themselves beyond the reach of civilization’s efforts to better itself.

Accordingly, here’s another comment, as posted on SOLNA:

New Albanian: We couldn't agree with you more about the absentee landlord & slum situation here in NA. Neighborhood groups worked together, when the Tribune did publish the eyesore of the week, with Council (which unanimously I think) supported, concerning rentals.

There was an old dumpster which had been sitting in the front of one of oldest buildings in NA for twenty (20) years. The Council and community helped pass an ordinance to OUTLAW dumpsters on a front lawn of a residence, unless it may be there temporarily for removal of remodeling.

We also worked with several Senior groups as they complained the BIG companies from Louisville were coming in the middle of the night and waking all up at obscene hours. We also had a commercial property in our now "mixed" planning, and one was throwing us all out of bed when that dumpster fell back to the ground.

The Council Members involved in helping us try ANYTHING were, let's see, Don Gibbons, Mark Seabrook, Larry Kochert, Bill Schmidt, Letty Walter, can't remember them all, and I apologize for that.

We wonder if the true rub of why we can't enforce our building rules, etc., is because we do not have a City Court? Not sure, but it could be a possibility.

You would absolutely have to have neighborhood groups UNITE to fight the slumlords of NA. They do have a lawyer, we watched them take up a collection, in the audience DURING the Council meeting. We all would have to find somehow to fund the thing to fight it, and the City just doesn't have the money now paying for those past mistakes.

We are all still concerned with the state of housing in this City. Unbelievable...

New Alb Annie elaborates in a NAC comment yesterday:

I don't think you'll ever see more buck passing and straw grasping as you'll get if you ask our administration and all our elected officials to support and establish a rental inspection program.

Steve Laduke was correct that some of the larger apt. complexes were concerned about the fee as it related to large multi-unit operations when the last administration promoted the program. And I always thought Overton's idea was half-baked--a good concept, but presented before all the kinks were worked out.

However, the bulk of the people at the meetings--and I attended a couple--were the major rental property owners in downtown New Albany and its outskirts, the ones who own houses that have been turned into rentals and larger buildings that have been converted. I listened to their comments as I sat among them, and my mom went to one of the property owners' private meetings. They had the funds to hire an attorney to fight any attempt at an inspection program, and were prepared to do so.

The question I asked as an audience member (the question I always ask but have never gotten a responsible answer for) was, "Why not enforce the building code for all dwellings, not just rentals? Some owner-occupied places are dumps, too." Kevin Boehnlein answered for Overton, and gave a new excuse for me to add to my list of Excuses I've Been Given For the Past Ten Years Regarding Why the New Albany Building Code Isn't Enforced: "We're not here to discuss the building code, we're here to talk about the rental inspection program."

Many of the landlords in attendance and in opposition appear on at least one elected official's campaign contribution report. I believe that is a question worth asking, although I am dubious of receiving an answer--why would an owner of multiple rental units in the City of New Albany make financial contributions to a political candidate?

Let's poll all City Council members and Mayor Garner to see if they will support and begin working on drafting an ordinance for rental inspections.By the way, The Tribune used to publish a photo on its front page once
a week called "Eyesore of the Week" and many of the local blighted rental dwellings were featured. "Eyesore of the Week" had a very short life.

In the months to come, you will hear it said that rental property reform is an attack on property rights.

This is false.

You will hear it said that rental property reform threatens to make life worse for tenants who already have few options.

This also is false.

The gist of what we are proposing is not a Stalinist elimination of the Kulak-like landlords as a class, and it is not about displacing the impoverished to live in unsightly boxes behind The Gary’s exurban church of choice.

It is recognizingthe root problem, formulating and advocating a solution, making property owners accountable by enforcing pre-existing laws, and in the end, making it possible to restore neighborhoods and to exalt the concept of community rather than to acquiesce in its degradation.

Times and priorities continue to change. We must change with them.

If the reform package proposed by the Overton administration was inadequate, it should be reworked. If the neighborhood associations didn’t cooperate before, now they must. If the political will to proceed was lacking, it needs to be strengthened. If we’re intimidated by arrogance publicly displayed by the unaccountable -- as expressed by landlords passing the hat at a public meeting -- then we need thicker skins and a stiff dose of courage.

If we’re a nation founded on law, we should enforce the law.

If not -- if we are to bow and scrape before those who consider themselves above the law -- then is there any value in anything that we're trying to do?