I wrote a two-part
series on February 20th and March 6th about the
effort—and time—required to remove a Housing Choice Voucher from a woman who
was clearly abusing it. My focus was on
how hard it is to get something like that done, but I did mention the
contrasting actions of the two landlords involved in the ongoing scam. I want to return to that point, because those
contrasting responses illustrate an important fact that we often lose sight of
when discussing the “Section 8” issue. We obsess about obnoxious tenants, but ignore their landlords. That is a serious mistake.
The lady in
question pulled her scams on two landlords.
One reported her, in an attempt to protect his property from further
damage. She then moved, and found a
landlord who didn’t care what she did.
During the several month period when a neighbor was monitoring both her
activities and the slow-moving wheels of the Montgomery County Housing
Authority, there is no evidence that her new landlord so much as lifted a finger to
address the issues his tenant was causing in the neighborhood. The contrast between their attitudes
demonstrates the difference between a landlord and a slumlord, and why we
should at least match our anger at welfare cheats with anger toward those who
enable them.
But first, a
point about the importance of landlords to a healthy urban community. Critics of urban life tend to use the
percentage of rental units as something of a shorthand for the health of an
urban community. The implicit assumption
is that the lower the percentage of rentals—and the higher the percentage of
home owners—the better. That impression
is not correct if utilized as an assumption. While we all acknowledge the importance of
homeownership, the simple fact is that not everyone can—or should—own a home,
particularly in an urban area. Rental
units always have been, are now and always will be a significant component of
any urban neighborhood (in the interest of full disclosure, my wife and I rent
an apartment).
The second
problem with fixating on rentals vs. homeowners is that a focus on the raw
number of rentals is not productive, because it misses the central point. Forget the percentage of rental properties;
there is a much more important question on which to focus: are those who own the rental buildings
LANDLORDS, or are they SLUMLORDS? To me,
there is a clear distinction between a landlord and a slumlord. Both own rental properties to earn a profit,
but their similarity pretty much ends at that point. Landlords maintain their properties, and try
to ensure that their tenants obey the rules and the law. Slumlords maximize their profit by avoiding
maintenance and don’t care about what their tenants might be doing. Slumlords find Housing Choice Vouchers too
lucrative to resist, and let their properties steadily deteriorate while they
squeeze out the maximum profit from them.
Landlords may accept a Voucher, but continue to maintain their property
in a good condition. This means that good
landlords are a necessary nutrient for a healthy community, while slumlords are
a cancer that saps a community’s health.
Remember: most
of the tax money we pay to support “Section 8” actually ends up in the pockets
of landlords. The Voucher holder never
touches it; it goes straight from the Housing Authority to the property
owner/manager. We focus on the tenant
because he or she provides the obvious evidence of the program’s faults, but we
ignore the owner. If property owners cared for their
properties, couldn’t the number of Voucher atrocities be cut substantially?
The answer to
that question borders on the obvious, but what can residents of towns afflicted
with slumlords and rotten tenants actually do?
Individual efforts, as I recounted earlier, are always difficult and
can be dangerous. Municipal governments
have proved to be largely incapable of conceiving and initiating any programs
to tackle the problem. So, if it’s
dangerous to do individually and you don’t trust your government, how about a
private company? Isn’t it the grand
American capitalist tradition to look to private initiatives instead of just
waiting for those from the government?
“Betterlandlord.us”
is just such a company. The firm is
based in Utah, where it has established a successful track record offering an
approach it calls the “Better Landlord Program.” The first step is a survey that involves
identifying all rental properties in a municipality (including those with
“shadow landlords”) and mapping them, then analyzing the costs of providing
services like police and code enforcement to these properties. It uses the information gathered to set
licensing fees for rentals. These fees
are the “stick” to prod landlords into joining the program.
Betterlandlords.us offers offers classes for property owners on how to
become better landlords, briefing them on good property management practices,
borough ordinances and how to attract better tenants. Property owners who take the course sign an
agreement that they will take steps to reduce crime, vandalism and blight on their properties. If they don’t complete the course or follow
the agreement, they are terminated from the program and forced to pay the licensing
fees for their properties. Those who
follow the program have the fees waived. The
company claims that it provides a sufficient "carrot" by pointing out how landlords
can make more money through property improvements and an improving rental
market. Such a program must be
established by a municipal council, which votes it into place, allocates funds for the initial study and then establishes the licensing fees. There is flexibility in both the rules and
the fees that allows each town to customize the program.
Utah is far
away, but some dedicated residents of Pottstown discovered the program and
brought word of it to the Schuylkill Valley.
I want to offer major kudos to the Citizens Action Committee for
Pottstown for recommending the program to their borough
council. Council voted (unanimously!) to undertake the program and allocated $18,500 to produce the initial survey. Pottstown’s citizen activists tell me they
are having trouble determining how much progress has been made to date, so we
should all hold our opinions about how things are going to go.
I also found
it fascinating that the Citizens Action Committee was invited to present the
program to the Neighborhood Watch of Phoenixville. Considering how everybody writes about how
well Phoenixville is doing and how bad Pottstown is, the fact that residents of
the former town are advising the latter demonstrates that reality is more
complex than is publicized, and that no matter how well a town is doing, there
is always room for improvement.
Will the “Good Landlord Program” work in Pottstown? Will it be implemented in Phoenixville? Stay tuned. I will be following developments and reporting back to you.
Will the “Good Landlord Program” work in Pottstown? Will it be implemented in Phoenixville? Stay tuned. I will be following developments and reporting back to you.
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