|
Dear John Smith,
Today, the Committee on Zoning, Landmarks, and Building Standards voted to approve the Fair and Accountable Illinois Rental (FAIR) ordinance. I voted in favor of the FAIR ordinance, and against the Protecting Renters Ordinance (PRO) which passed the Committee on Housing and Real Estate yesterday, for a number of reasons, and I wanted to take this opportunity to clarify my position on these related measures.
Both of the ordinances update the City’s longstanding Residential Landlord and Tenant Ordinance (RLTO) which governs the relationship between tenants in rental units and rental housing providers. This update is long overdue. The 40-year-old RLTO is out of date, and needs to be adjusted to account for how housing is constructed, rented, and maintained in today's rental marketplace. This is an especially important issue to the 3rd Ward as, according to the American Community Survey, out of the approximately 29,000 total households in the ward, over 17,300 are rental housing. As both the FAIR and PRO ordinances exempt CHA units, a full 12,600 households (43% of the Ward) would be impacted by these new rental regulations.
While both FAIR and PRO have many similar provisions, the PRO ordinance imposes far too many burdens on local landlords, increasing the cost of providing housing, which in turn, will limit the development of badly needed additional housing units. Chicago needs more housing. Period. We are not meeting our existing needs, and the lack of available housing both drives up the cost of rent, and tilts the rental market too far in favor of landlords. Having an adequate supply of housing would solve these issues.
The FAIR ordinance on the other hand, would help encourage the construction of new housing units while still offering strong tenant protections. These protections include a ban on certain junk fees, better notification requirements for tenants, holding bad actors accountable, and protecting small mom-and-pop landlords and their properties. This is important. Tenants deserve protection, as do our neighborhood housing providers.
While neither ordinance is perfect, my hope is that with both ordinances passing their respective committees, we can work together to craft a balanced measure that protects both renters and landlords big and small. This can be achieved BECAUSE both ordinances passed committee. All parties now have the opportunity to work together to craft a compromise ordinance that will be an improvement to both the original FAIR and PRO proposals. I welcome this discussion and I am committed to being part of a solution that meets the needs of all Chicagoans.
Sincerely,
| 
