City Council considering registrations for rental homes

If you own or rent a rental property in Wichita, a new policy being considered by the Wichita City Council could affect you.

The council is currently reviewing a provision that could require registrations for rental homes.

Currently, there are no registrations for rental homes, and there are no inspections unless a complaint is filed, said Mary K. Vaughn, city housing director.

“All you have to do is stick a ‘For Rent’ sign in your yard,” Vaughn said.

According to the most recent census numbers from 2010, Wichita has 58,684 renter-occupied housing units – about 35 percent of the total units in the city.

Council members are in the early stages of discussing the proposal and are seeking more input from the public and the industry. The specifics of the registration or inspections, including cost, haven’t been determined.

“You want to be careful not to hinder good landlords and get in the way of allowing them to have rentals. That would never be the goal,” council member James Clendenin, who represents southeast Wichita, said after the council discussed the policy in its meeting Tuesday night. “But we do need to find a way to hold bad landlords, who do not keep their houses to code and do not consider the dignity of their tenants and neighbors, accountable.”

Mayor Jeff Longwell asked the council to “proceed with extreme caution if we’re going to change policies on new regulations on rental properties,” saying there needs to be more community discussion.

Council member Jeff Blubaugh, who is in the real estate business and represents southwest Wichita, also had concerns about increasing regulations on landlords in the current market.

But Kevin Andrews, president and CEO of Neighborhood Affordable Housing Services, told the council that some landlords are slumlords who will put “people into homes that have the word ‘Crack’ written across the door (for) ‘Crack house’ and into homes that don’t meet city code.”

Clendenin said his district has many renters and some blighted areas.

“You might have two-bedroom houses that were meant to be temporary in Planeview that rent for more than $1,000 a month, and those houses are deplorable. I don’t know how else to put it,” Clendenin said. “That’s unacceptable, and people, no matter who they are and where they come from, should not be treated that way.”

City Manager Robert Layton said the council will have more workshops to discuss its housing policy, and council members hope to approve a final version by the end of the year.

This story was originally published September 22, 2015 at 9:45 PM with the headline "City Council considering registrations for rental homes."