Click here to read the Minnesota Court of Appeals opinion about rental housing limits in the City of Winona.
Word is going around of meetings and discussions in our city government about possible limits on rental housing in North Minneapolis, something home owners in our troubled neighborhood have asked for, lobbied for, BEGGED FOR the last couple decades. For the longest time, it seemed impossible because...
...of a widespread assumption by our elected officials that the courts would find such limits unconstitutional. And this wasn't an assumption without basis, no, not at all.
However, some months ago the City of Winona fought for limits on rental density and WON. Click here for a news article. I notice the lawyer who fought the case for Winona is named George Hoff. He is no known relation to this blogger but would I hug him close to my bosom if I should happen to meet him?
Oh, yes.
This case has excited and energized a number of people involved in North Minneapolis neighborhood issues, who have long seen limits on rental density as the most effective solution to neglectful absentee landlords who are the lynchpin to almost all of our neighborhood crime issues.
However, the Winona case is not over. Currently, it's being appealed to the Minnesota Supreme Court. Also, the long list of organizations writing amicus briefs is impressive; and the majority are pushing hard for a libertarian, laissez faire approach to regulating the rental market...which is what we already have in North Minneapolis, and every day we live that nightmare of stampeding capitalism.
I would like to ask my fellow libertarians: How is it that a radical ideal of personal liberty somehow translates into vigorously defending the very worst in our society? Pimps, pornographers, drug couriers, neglectful landlords, arms dealers...all these defended in the name of ultimate capitalistic freedom by my radical libertarian brethren.
Sigh. This is one of the many reasons I fell out of love with libertarian author Ayn Rand after a passionate affair in my 20s.
Anyway...
The Winona case, if it's upheld by the Minnesota State Supreme Court, says that rental property limits of THIRTY PERCENT are constitutional.
What a dream world we'd have in North Minneapolis if we could roll back the rental tidal wave to a mere 30 percent. Yes, one presumes it would take a long time and there would be a lot of "grandfathered" rentals.
But, over time...
We could have ourselves a decent neighborhood.
15 comments:
As usual, clicking on your links goes nowhere. No court of appeals decision, anyway.
For some reason our worthless city leaders think that having "people" in these homes is better than having the houses sit vacant. I disagree. I'd rather have a property sit empty than have, most likely, problem people living in them. It's all about the property tax collection I'm sure, but how much does the city spend responding to slumlord problems?
JACC brought up joining this suit as an agenda item at their housing committee meeting last night. However, the members who requested this to be on the agenda were not present and it was therefore tabled. It was also felt that they needed more information to make an informed decision.
It's not just rentals, it's also the contract-for-deeds that serve as camouflage for equally bad, if not worse, "tenants" and "landlords". The only accountability between a destructive contract-for-deed tenant and the mortgage holder/owner is a breach of contract meted out in civil court by the owner to the "tenant". If the mortgage holder/owner doesn't give a flying F about how the tenant destroys the property (likely someone whose rental history is so bad they can't get housing, or are a sex offender or are under house arrest) there's is little recourse for unfortunate neighbors of such a mess. The City should have the power to over see these agreements and terminate them if the tenant is not upholding the contract terms (whether the mortgage holder/owner cares or not) and/or if the tenant's living situation is becoming a 311 or 911 nuisance.
Link should be fixed, now. Thank you for pointing out that problem so I could fix it.
Actually, the discussion at the JACC housing meeting was not about rental density. It was about a lawsuit or some form of housing complaint filed regarding the over-concentration of certain federal housing/stimulus funds in our neighborhoods, and how those programs allegedly contribute to housing disparities and concentrations of poverty. Some other organizations on the northside have expressed support for this claim.
If my summary seems a bit vague, it's because most the people present, including myself, had only read articles about the complaint, and not the complaint itself. One attendee had read the full complaint and began to give her take on it, which was very different than the summary provided to me and other JACC members (by folks who wound up not attending).
Because it was clear we didn't have enough information to have a sound discussion, and because the people who requested the issue be brought up weren't there, the committee tabled the discussion until a later date.
There are two novels that can change a bookish fourteen-year old’s life: The Lord of the Rings and Atlas Shrugged.
One is a childish fantasy that often engenders a lifelong obsession with its unbelievable heroes, leading to an emotionally stunted, socially crippled adulthood, unable to deal with the real world.
The other, of course, involves orcs.
— John Rogers
Get on a new story u are slacking !!!! It takes u days to post something new lol I'm going crazy ctfu
another book that can change a youngsters life is the BIBLE!
A Minneapolis politician is more familiar with the contents of Karl Marx's Das Kapital or Mao Zedong's Little Red Book than Atlas Shrugged.
How about insisting through court convictions that the repeat offenders permanently 'get out of Dodge, and stay out'.
How about good old fashioned 'banning'. After so many criminal convictions for serious crimes, a'get out of Dodge' sentence is given. A lifetime ban on being in Minnesota and/ or Minneapolis. A '3 strikes and you are in for life' would also be reasonable. We have many thugs who moved here from states with that law. Moving criminals from rentals on the northside just gives other areas the grief of their presence.
I am publishing part of a comment but rejecting some of the comment, because the rejected portion criticizes the Muslim religion in crude terms. I do not care to have that kind of issue on my blog. Unfortunately, those who believe passionately in the First Amendment have had to muzzle themselves concerning criticisms of the Muslim religion ever since, by my reckoning, the publication of The Satanic Verses in the 1980s.
Here is the comment with portions redacted:
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A fucking crutch that has been, and still, is being used to justify cutting people's heads off and total mistreatment of women. What a good fucking book the bible XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX...stone your old lady on her fathers doorstep and dash your your children on the fucking rocks... I read the
XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX SXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX
Check it out if you do not believe me...XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX
Dude...I was fucking talking about CHRISTIANITY MOTHER FUCKER!!! Get your self biased righteous lies in order and your presumptions(or white boy negligence) about it being about Islam tells me YOU have something against our Muslim brothers and sisters...how many Muslims did you murder in Afghanistan, you ignorant white- christian asshole??? Fuck you when you do not print a whole comment...mea culpa in order bitch private-no class undesirable discharge piece of shit.
Convenient for you to misstate, misconstrue and just plain fib about the portion of the comment I didn't print which does indeed give insult to Islam.
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