On Budget Concept Menu Item PS1.09

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Christopher Hutchins
Posts: 51
Joined: Wed Jan 21, 2015 12:58 pm

On Budget Concept Menu Item PS1.09

Post by Christopher Hutchins »

From Council Member Houston:

The identification, inspection and licensing of residential homes, that house more than 7 unrelated individuals, has been long standing. In 2009, the State passed legislation (HB 216) allowing cities to license and inspect homes and developed ‘model standards’ which could be used to ensure health and safety for residents.
In 2010, the City convened an internal work group of city staff to work on the issue. Their work expanded to include stakeholders as well and their work continued until 2012. In 2012, the City Council passed Resolution 201220524-086, requiring CODE and the HHS Department to survey homes within the city. The results showed a significant number of homes in operation in the city. The city started a process to inspect and permit these homes ensuring first, that they were safe; secondly, that there were individual protections for residents. A budget of $450,000 was proposed; efforts to educate the public were planned. However, efforts were thwarted due to a number of reasons. In 2015, efforts restarted; now the city has a Reasonable Accommodations ordinance to ensure protections for individuals in these homes under the federal fair housing statutes. CODE has worked with an interagency Task Force, including local and state providers and stakeholders and are now ready to begin a process for inspecting and permitting these homes. The majority of these homes are in District 1, although some are also in other parts of the city.
To accomplish this, I have put on the Concept Menu PS1.09, which totals $234,697 for two FTEs, a compliance officer to inspect these homes and a program specialist to ensure these homes are registered, meet the International Property Code requirements, and pay the registration fee.
Policy Aide
Office of Ora Houston, District 1