Public Hearing Set Tonight for SLC Good Landlord Program
12.01.2009 by Elizabeth Ziegler
(KCPW News) Salt Lake City could be next in a growing number of Utah cities to enact a good landlord program that encourages background checks on tenants and speedy evictions for trouble-makers. Salt Lake City Council Chairman Carlton Christensen says the proposed Landlord-Tenant Initiative is a good policy with a proven track record of reducing crime.
“It’s really just a kind of a handful of really bad landlords who just don’t get it that create the largest part of our problem and create really a very disproportionate share of enforcement issues,” Christensen says. “And this is a good strong policy to get us to where we would like to be.”
Under the ordinance, landlords who participate in the voluntary program would be eligible for discounted city fees. Seven cities have already enacted similar ordinances, including South Salt Lake, West Valley City, West Jordan and Ogden.
Utah Apartment Association President Paul Smith says the program significantly reduces crime on rental properties, including an 18 percent decrease in South Salt Lake and a 31 percent decrease in Ogden. But if the city makes it harder to rent to problem tenants, will they just be forced to go somewhere else?
“There is some displacement, no question,” Smith says. “But I think the hope here, ultimately, is that people change their behaviors; that bad tenants think twice about being bad tenants that criminals think twice about being criminals because it will ultimately limit their housing choices. And that would be good for society.”*
The Salt Lake City Council will hold a public hearing tonight on the Landlord Tenant Initiative. It’s expected to vote on the proposal next week.
I think that the Good Landlord Program is a fantastic example of how private enterprise and government can work together. It makes sense to me to have a landlord take some training. We require restaurant operators to be licensed and educated to ensure that they don’t make the community sick. A landlord can also make a community sick. I am tired of bad landlords who neglect their properties to the detriment of the whole neighborhood. Bad tenants can more easily be dealt with by the landlord than by law enforcement. Giving an incentive to good landlords who reduce the city’s costs is a great idea.
Having been a landlord in West Valley City, and having sold that property (thank goodness), my experience is that this program is a terrible idea. Bad tenants are more easily dealt with by law enforcement than the landlord. No landlords want bad tenants and dirty properties, but their only recourse with bad tenants is to go through a troublesome and difficult eviction process, during which the tenants threaten to “trash” their property. I know this firsthand. It is a terrible idea and doesn’t work, only increases costs and rents. If law enforcement vigorously dealt with the renters, rather than the landlords, a lot of trouble would be saved.