The Boise City Council discussed possible tenant protections on Tuesday, although the council was divided on whether requiring relocation assistance for displaced residents was a good idea.
Boise Mayor Lauren McLean said the goal was to walk through different potential rental protections and specifically referenced a situation last month in which people in an apartment complex were told on a Friday they had to be out by Monday for their safety.
“What can a city do to make sure that renters have some protections built into the agreements they have with landlords?” McLean said. “Together, we believe, (these options) could provide some protections to our residents to make sure that people are staying housed, that we have affordable homes for everyone, and those that have them have some certainty.”
Nicki Hellenkamp, who works on housing in the mayor’s office, said state law limits what the city can do. For example, she said the city cannot limit the amount rent can increase.
For the past couple of years, Boise’s rental market has been on fire, with units hitting and leaving the market quickly, huge rent jumps and increases in homelessness and evictions. In the second quarter of last year, the rental vacancy rate was 1.66%, below the healthy rate of around 7% to 8%.
“As our community has grown and changed, we’ve seen the market change significantly for renters in Boise,” Hellenkamp said.
However, the Legislature this session did take on renters protections. Gov. Brad Little in March signed a bill that required fees imposed on tenants to be reasonable and not greater than what is in the lease, according to the Idaho Capital Sun.
The council discussed four policies: prohibiting retaliation, providing notice of tenant rights and responsibilities, prohibiting discrimination on the source of income (such as child support) and requiring relocation assistance in some circumstances.
These were just policy discussion items, however, and there are no drafts of ordinances. Some landlords already provide many of the protections on the list, but the goal is to standardize what tenants can expect, Hellenkamp said.
“This is in no way an exhaustive list,” Hellenkamp said. “Instead, it’s meant to be a starting place for our conversation.”
The retaliatory conduct policy would establish that renters could raise concerns, make repair requests, become a member of a community resident association and retain legal counsel without fear of rent increases and termination or non-renewal of their lease.
These protections are already established for those in mobile home parks, Hellenkamp said.
“This type of provision also benefits landlords,” Hellenkamp said. “A dynamic in which tenants fear raising issues creates the risk for greater costs to those property owners who may not be notified by tenants of smaller repair needs, until they escalate into larger and more expensive problems.”
A notice of landlord and tenant responsibilities would be provided to new tenants. It would include information on repairs, security deposit return, discrimination protections and fees.
Prohibiting source of income discrimination is intended to allow people who meet income requirements to rent, even if the income is from child support, veterans benefits and retirees who use savings to pay for housing costs. Over 100 cities and 20 states have similar laws, including Utah and North Dakota, Hellenkamp said.
For relocation assistance, the goal is for tenants to receive help if they are displaced due to demolition, a substantial renovation or changing the use of a building. This includes help with the search for a new place to live, financial assistance and a full security deposit return.
The next steps are additional stakeholder outreach and then returning to the city council with draft ordinances.
Councilmember Jimmy Hallyburton said the income discrimination one is important because there are landlords who don’t take Section 8 vouchers. Many people are on a waiting list for a while for a voucher and then have trouble using it, he said. Hallyburton also said there should be education for landlords on how to work with vouchers.
Newly sworn-in Councilmember Latonia Haney Keith said the city should engage with Idaho Legal Aid and the Intermountain Fair Housing Council because it’s a tough burden to take a landlord to court and prove retaliation and income discrimination.
“Especially for those individuals from a lower socioeconomic status, the power imbalance still exists between a landlord and a tenant,” Haney Keith said. “In those instances where there is retaliation or there may be discrimination, there is a dearth of support for legal services associated with those particular tenants.”
Haney Keith added that she wanted there to be assistance for those who are on month-to-month leases. She also said further protections were needed.
“There are many other ways to decide to decline to rent to an individual, especially given the low supply that we have of housing right now,” Haney Keith said.
Councilmember Patrick Bageant said he was mostly on board but said when it comes to retaliation, he was concerned that non-renewal of tenancy would force a landlord-tenant relationship for years while a dispute is resolved.
“In my mind, a landlord or a tenant should be able to walk away from each other within the terms of their agreement at any time,” Bageant said.
He also said he was uncomfortable with the relocation assistance and said he didn’t know how it would work.
“Each situation is different and valuing it with a generic formula to say, ‘here’s how much money you’re entitled to,’ doesn’t feel like a great fit, so I’m still very uncomfortable with that one, but as you said, a lot more discussion needs to happen,” Bageant said.
Bageant also wondered whether corporate mega-landlords and people who just owned one unit or rented out a room in their home would need to be subject to the same regulations, or if these would apply to short-term rentals.
Councilmember Luci Willits said much of this makes sense but said she was uncomfortable with requiring a landlord to issue a cash payment if they decide to change the use of their property.
“I think it goes too far,” Willits said. “I think it will have a cost to the tenant because that money’s got to come from somewhere, so it may end up hurting the tenant in a way that I don’t think is helpful.”
Councilmember Colin Nash, who was also sworn in earlier this month, said the city could take a role in assistance versus compelling a private landlord to do so.
Hallyburton asked again about relocation assistance and how it could work and who would ultimately pay.
“I think that there’s probably a variety of different ways that it could work out,” Hallyburton said. “And us trying to figure out, what is the goal … and who is going to be the folks who might be providing these funds?”
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