[bouldercouncilhotline] Hotline: Occupancy Ordinance

[cmosupport at bouldercolorado.gov]

Sender: Shoemaker, Andrew

This message is to the City Attorney’s Office regarding the Occupancy Ordinance item on the agenda for this Tuesday:
(1) In light of the concerns raised by landlords today about holding tenants accountable when a landlord has been misled, would you please give consideration to providing Tuesday at the hearing an ordinance alternative that deletes the affirmative defense as you have proposed, but that also provides that if a landlord can demonstrate that he/she has complied with the posting, advertising , and lease disclosure requirements of the ordinance, has received only rent checks from persons on the lease, and has required each tenant to sign a disclosure form where the tenant acknowledges the occupancy limitations (it should be in large font, on a single page by itself and requiring a signature on the page), along with any other responsible measures that a reasonable landlord should take, then the tenants on the lease (rather than the landlord) would become responsible for the fine.
(2) Also, consistent with some of our prior discussions at Council, would you be prepared to discuss whether we might also address a rental license loophole relating to rentals by students whose parents purchase and own the property, where right now this occupancy enforcement ordinance would have little effect because of the lack of a rental license needed for an owner-occupied rental?  Recall that no rental license is necessary for an owner or family member of an owner to rent a couple of rooms in his or
her house, which exception is in place for a number of obvious reasons.   However, parents of students often purchase a house for the student to live in and rent out to friends (indeed, this is actively marketed to parents by local realtors, see for example, www.boulderstudentsales.com),
and no rental license is required in connection with the rentals, even though the person in charge at the house may not be legal to consume alcohol or cannabis or be of an age where some might question their judgment to make sure the house is safe where there has been no rental inspection required.  Accordingly, would it be possible to require that for any property where the resident owner is younger than 21, they need a rental license (and would therefore there would be a safety inspection and many of these occupancy
disclosures would kick in) to rent rooms at the house.   Thank you and have a nice weekend,

Andrew Shoemaker
Member, Boulder City Council