AN ORDINANCE amending Seattle Municipal Code sections 22.206.160 and 22.214.075 to prohibit evictions of residential tenants from rental housing units if the units are not registered with the Department of Planning and Development as required by SMC 22.214.040.
The bill passes and the chair will sign it. The report of the Housing Affordability, Human Services and Economic Resiliency Committee. Please read item six. Three by the Committee on Housing Affordability, Human Services and Economic Resiliency Agenda. Item number six Council Bill 118 340 Amending certain Mr. Code Sections 2.206. 160 and 22.21 4.0 75. To prohibit evictions of residents residential tenants from rental housing units if the units are not registered with the Department of Planning and Development as required by SNC. 22.2 14.0 40. The committee recommends that the bill passed as amended. Thank you, Councilmember Clark. Thank you. This item relates to a bigger policy and program change that the city instituted a couple of years ago, which is the requirement that if you run a rental housing business of however many units that might be small or large, you have to be registered with the city. And it is part of attesting and proving that rental properties in the city of Seattle are actually safe and habitable for people to live in. One of the things that was unfortunately not addressed at the time has to do with evictions, and none of us really like to talk about evictions, but they happen, and both parties should be well aware of their rights within that. One thing that we didn't note was that really in order to pursue an eviction, one needs to be legally registered and operating under the law within the city of Seattle in order to have protection of the just cause ordinance. So this proposed legislation prohibits a rental property owner from evicting a tenant from a rental housing unit. If the rental unit is not registered as required, not properly registered under the city's rental registration and inspection ordinance. Under the city's ordinance, owners of rental properties must be registered by a certain date, depending on how many units are in the building. So properties with ten or more units, they needed to be registered by September 30th of 2014. Properties with 5 to 9 rental units must be registered by March 31st of 2015. That's very soon for anybody who's listening. Properties with between one and four rental housing units. And that's really the larger the larger mass of owners in the in the city must be registered between June 15th and December of 2016. So again, this makes clear that in order to pursue an eviction, if you're supposed to be signed up with the rental registration and inspection ordinance , that you had to do that in order to be pursuing a just cause eviction in the city of Seattle. There we did have some helpful commentary from folks who unfortunately have experience with evictions, be it on the tenant side or the landlord side in court. And so we did work out an amendment that was forwarded by the Washington Multifamily Housing Association, and I appreciate their careful review of this. And there was the issue brought up that if really there's a health and safety issue coming up and if the if the property owner is pursuing a court level eviction and if it really is a health and safety issue, you don't want somebody to have to start over. You want to be able to help cure the problem quickly. So this amendment allows a rental owner who has filed an eviction lawsuit in court and who becomes aware that the rental unit is not registered under under REO to be able to pursue the eviction with just cause that they have time then to become registered and then to proceed with the lawsuit, they would not have to start over from square one again. It allows the owner to comply with you and then to proceed with the lawsuit without it being fully dismissed by the judge or the magistrate. The situation could arise in the early phases of implementation of the rental, registration and inspection ordinance. I think we have we have another report coming up soon, letting us giving us some idea of how many people we think are registered at this point. And so the numbers are climbing, but it is an education process. The committee recommends adoption of this change. Thank you. Questions or comments? Council members who want. I think this is a good step forward, and I'm happy to support this council bill to close the particular loophole as described by Councilmember Clark in the city, still in protections. And we all know this is happening rampantly throughout the city where there are more and more horror stories of tenants in Seattle losing their homes to the greed of developers. And just as an example of how much farther we need to go, my office I started organizing with a building full of tenants near Otello, and those tenants are being told that they will not have access to relocation assistance because of the kind of leases they sign. And they are being told by their landlord that they sign away their lives, their right to relocation assistance from the by the leases that were signed years ago. This particular law that we're voting on today is a good thing, but that's the the loophole that is allowing the landlord to exploit those tenants in Ontario will not be addressed. But this law and I raised this to point out that there are so many loopholes that are being used as use against tenants. And we need laws to close all of those loopholes and to protect tenants. Any other questions or comments? Please call the role on the passage of the bill. Clerk Darren Harrell. Licata O'Brien II Rasmussen. So while President Burgess. Ian Favre. None oppose. The bill passes and the chair will sign it. Please read items seven and eight.