LV urges rental inspections

Dan Kulin

Saturday, Feb. 4, 2006 | 12:33 p.m.

Las Vegas city administrators are pushing for a rental inspection program that is drawing opposition from apartment owners who argue that the high price, invasion of privacy and existing laws make the plan burdensome and unnecessary.

The criticisms mirror those that more than a year ago derailed a similar inspection program that had been proposed by North Las Vegas staff.

Officials from Las Vegas, like their North Las Vegas counterparts before them, claim the program is needed to eliminate slums and to keep properties from going downhill.

The proposed program, they contend, would allow inspections of apartments that they otherwise would never see because many tenants are too afraid of possible landlord retribution to complain about poor living conditions.

The proposed Las Vegas program could go to the City Council this spring and, if approved, could be in place by the fall.

Although council members have not yet publicly discussed the issue, Las Vegas Mayor Oscar Goodman said he supports the program.

"I think it's good to do (this) as a city to ensure safety," he said. "There's nothing more important than safety."

Neighborhood Services Department Director Orlando Sanchez said the proposed Las Vegas rental inspection program would - with several notable exceptions - charge $25 per apartment annually for inspections.

The inspections would be conducted only on complexes with four or more rental units, the threshold for requiring a business license, and only on complexes more than 5 years old.

City officials estimate that there are about 54,000 apartments that would fall under the proposed inspection program, but do not envision inspecting all of them.

Instead, in each complex the city would inspect 10 percent of the apartments, and never less than two units. However, if problems are found in the sample apartments, city inspectors would visit all of the apartments in the complex.

Apartment complexes that receive the cleanest inspections would receive a two-year waiver from the annual inspection and fee, Sanchez said.

The annual fee is expected to cover the cost of the proposed program, which is expected to require six full-time staff, Sanchez said.

To ensure that the city does not continue the program if it does not live up to expectations, the proposed inspection program would include a 10-year sunset clause.

Dana Murrah, president of the Southern Nevada Multi-Housing Association and regional vice president of Colonial Properties Trust, opposes the proposed program. She would rather see the city push a proposed tenants' bill of rights.

The association represents 304 apartment management and ownership firms, including hers, which owns about 1,000 apartments in Las Vegas.

"Our concern is for the privacy of the residents and affordable housing," she said. "Residents are very uncomfortable with people being in their home.

"Also, this ordinance is not really necessary, there are state statutes and ordinances already out there, the residents already have that protection."

Judd Abrams, senior vice president at Maury Abrams Co., which has about 1,100 apartments in Las Vegas, said the proposed inspection fee unfairly punishes good landlords and will burden tenants.

"Expenses are expenses and they are all going up," he said. "These tenants may already be strapped."

Sanchez said the proposed tenants' bill of rights, which Abrams also supports, is insufficient to address the issue. Sanchez also dismissed claims that $25 a year would be a burden on the tenants who likely would ultimately pay the charge through higher rents.

Sabra Smith-Newby, another Neighborhood Services staffer working on the inspection program, said the proposed tenant's bill of rights falls short of providing any real help to tenants caught in a bad situation.

"It's basically a restatement of the laws that are already out there," she said.

Sanchez said that if the inspection program is enacted, city inspectors would be mindful of privacy concerns.

The city would give 14-day and 24-hour notices before inspections, Sanchez said. If a tenant did not want the city inspectors inside his apartment, officials would simply go to another apartment in the complex, he said.

While existing laws address building conditions, Sanchez said those laws essentially require the city to be invited into a home or apartment. At the very least, the program would get the city into problem properties sooner, Sanchez said.

If such a program already existed, Sanchez said the city could have headed off the deplorable conditions at the Monterey Villas complex near the Stratosphere, or those at the Peter Pan apartments off Fremont Street.

When North Las Vegas considered a similar proposal in 2004, a vote was delayed indefinitely after that city's council told its staff to further study the issue. North Las Vegas City Manager Gregory Rose said the primary problem with the proposal was the privacy issue.

Dan Kulin can be reached at 259-8826 or at dan@lasvegassun.com.