College Station City Council eyes changes in home rental registration

Source: The Eagle, Bryan, TexasDec.自存倉 15--The College Station City Council is considering changes to its rental registration process, including clamping down on code violators or those who fail to tell the city that the property is being used for rent.The roughly 6,500 registered rental homes in College Station continue to be a hot-button issue for residents, property investment owners and the City Council. On Thursday, Lance Simms, assistant director of planning and development services for the city, asked for council's approval to move forward with a survey of rental property owners and property management companies, neighborhood associations and homeowners associations and city departments that use the city's rental registration program to assess its effectiveness."I think that we've heard enough this fall that we know we have an issue," said councilwoman Blanche Brick. "We've heard it from the neighborhoods that have asked for help in ways they can limit it, and we've chose not to be more strict on that, and now we're hearing it from people who are renting property within those neighborhoods who are trying to say, 'I want to do the right thing.'"Currently, rental homes are registered with the city and violations are handled through criminal enforcement. If the city suspects owners are breaking an ordinance, such as having more than four unrelated people living there, they must send three written letters before the case goes before a municipal judge."I think it's been effective, but we do have a couple of property owners that are refusing to renew," Simms said.Another possibility the council inquired about was an administrative hearing process, which would be more of a civil court process. Upon notice of violation, an administrative hearing can be called where the property owners could be found guilty of violations. Fines for violators can be established by council and can escalate for repeat offenders. The property owner can appeal the ruling of the administrative hearing.The potential change that generated the most discussion was switching to a rental permit process instead of simply registering with the city. If someone violated the ordinance, the permit could be suspended or revoked."If you have a violation or somebody's renting to more than four unrelated, that may be c迷你倉use for revoking or suspending a permit, and that is a lot more powerful and effective than fining someone," Simms said. "What you're doing there is serious and what you're doing is taking away their ability to make income off a rental property."Councilwoman Julie Schultz said she was immediately concerned about revoking someone's ability to make a living when it's difficult to determine who is living in a home versus visiting."To make it so severe when maybe it's not as black and white to prove concerns me," she said.Brick said she doesn't look at it as revoking anyone's right to make a living."I'm looking at it as the right for some people to be a public nuisance and to destroy the integrity of the neighborhood," Brick said. "I know that sometimes it is hard to tell who lives there, but we've all had enough examples sent to us that people who are partying on the roof are probably not the ones who have the strongest investment in families in those neighborhoods or in the integrity of that neighborhood."Councilman Karl Mooney said he was interested in the permit process, but pointed to the cost associated with it, including performing inspections and piling more work on code enforcement officers, which is an area the city has cut back on in recent years. In the most current budget season, the council added one part-time code enforcement officer.Simms said he thinks the inspections won't be necessary to issue a permit.The council gave permission to move forward with the surveys, and the rental registration process will be discussed at the council's strategic retreat in January."I think we have to be aware that there is a cost to this but there is a greater cost to watching our neighborhoods disintegrate," Brick said. "I think we have to step up and find something we can do in a quantitative way that will say, 'We do have some boundaries, we do have some expectations, and we do expect to uphold these.'"Another change discussed was relaxing the definition of an absentee owner. A local point of contact must currently be established if a property owner lives more than 30 miles away, but there has been a push to extend the radius further.Copyright: ___ (c)2013 The Eagle (Bryan, Texas) Visit The Eagle (Bryan, Texas) at .theeagle.com Distributed by MCT Information Servicesmini storage