Seattle Press on Line - City Council Votes to Put Teeth in Pro-Tenant Laws

City Council Votes to Put Teeth in Pro-Tenant Laws

By Allie Holly-Gottlieb

Apr 04, 2001 -- On Monday, March 26, the City Council passed Councilmember Judy Nicastro's "prohibited acts" ordinance by a 6-3 vote, making it easier for tenants and the city to sue landlords for retaliation. Apparently, Seattle's landlord lobby is okay with that.

"We didn't oppose the ordinance," says Jim Nell, Executive Director of Apartment Association of Seattle and King County (AASK). "I would say that we are interested in working with the city to get at bad landlords."

Actually, AASK, the region's largest rental housing owners' association and a tireless lobbying force for landlords, fervently opposed the ordinance. "Defeat of this ordinance is AASK's number one legislative priority for the new year," AASK attorney and past president Chris Benis wrote in the organization's February 7 newsletter.

The fact that AASK representatives are sending mixed messages about their position on this piece of legislation signals two things. Not only are they taking the recent changes to Seattle's landlord retaliation law seriously, but they also weren't quite sure how to fend them off. This confusion marks a shift from two decades ago, when the landlord lobby was so effective that it both defeated a Seattle rent control initiative and compelled the state to broadly ban rent control in 1981.

Now, rather than leading the state to pass landlord-protection laws, AASK is reacting to Nicastro's tenant-protection laws. In this case, AASK's response was to press Nicastro's colleagues on the council to tack on amendments that dilute the ordinance. The association's lobbying efforts were successful in that councilmembers added some restrictions to the ordinance. However, the bigger picture is that Nicastro's pro-renter tweaks to housing laws have AASK snapping at her heels.

Nicastro says she isn't concerned that the landlord association is always a step behind her. "First of all," says she, "we won."

What did we win? The city has been unable to prosecute landlords for retaliating when tenants complain about them to the city. The law "lacked teeth," as Nicastro puts it. City attorneys failed to prosecute 89 cases of alleged landlord retaliation from 1995 to 1999 because of lack of evidence, according to the city's figures. In that time, the city won just 12 guilty pleas or verdicts out of the 33 retaliation charges it did file against landlords.

In 1999, tenants of Capitol Hill's Eileen Court apartments sued their landlord, Reyn Yates, for jacking up their rent in an act of retaliation. The rent increases were allegedly retaliatory because the tenants had complained to the city when they were evicted without the 90-day notice and relocation assistance required in Seattle. City attorneys lost the highly publicized retaliation case "despite strong evidence that retaliation did indeed occur," according to renters' rights group the Tenants Union's November 1999 newsletter.

New Teeth for an Old Law

The new legislation reduces the burden of proof in such retaliation cases by making the standard civil instead of criminal. Once the law goes into effect (when the mayor signs it or 30 days from its passage), tenants will only have to show a "preponderance of the evidence." Basically, that means that tenants need to show a pattern of abuse to win a retaliation case. Nicastro says this is easier to prove than the criminal standard, "beyond a reasonable doubt," which, she points out, is used in murder cases. If a landlord is found guilty, the civil fine can be up to $300. The criminal punishment included a fine of up to $5,000 and a year in jail.

Thanks to help from the Tenants Union, Nicastro's ordinance also packs in organizing rights for renters. It gives tenants a "private right of action" to sue landlords for damages of up to $1,000, and shifts the burden of proof for certain outlawed acts from the tenant to the landlord.

Drago Amendments Dilute Impact of New Law

Meanwhile, although unable to stop the passage of Nicastro's ordinance, AASK left its mark. Councilmember Jan Drago--who, along with Jim Compton and Richard McIver, ultimately voted against the ordinance--managed to slip through two amendments that Nicastro calls "onerous" and Tenants Union organizer Scott Winn dubs "pro-landlord." Drago's first amendment restricts tenants' ability to sue management as a whole. Only the person who actually commits a violation can be found guilty. Drago's other amendment limits the amount of money tenants can win when they sue for damages to a "per incident" rather than "per tenant" rule.

AASK's Jim Nell boasts that all but one of his group's amendments passed this time. But AASK's relationship to Nicastro is telling. Since waging a failing, roughly $20,000 campaign against Nicastro's City Council run in 1999, AASK looked on helplessly at Nicastro's well-attended Renters' Summit last June and was unable to prevent her from getting the city to prioritize repealing the state ban on rent control. To sum up, Nicastro sure is keeping AASK busy.

"[AASK] is really working the landlords into a frenzy over me and the laws," Nicastro says.

Reader Comments

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christine haslet	Jan 17, 2003	seattle, washington	photographer/RN
I am in the middle of a nightmare because my tenant has decided that enforcing my lease agreement is retalition. He has also insisted that speaking to the other tenant in the building about the sharing of the yard is retaliation..... I have served him with a 10-day comply or vacate for about a 1/2 dozen lease violoations. He goes to an attorney and screams retaliation.....then HE calls the DCLU and files a complaint about the cracked side walk, sqeakiy board on the stairs in front of the house....a missing handraiil .....and basement door that doesn't swing shut. He lives in a beautifully restored 1901 Victorian in Wallingford. I've hired two seperate attorneys, and paid big bucks....and they won't even touch this case because they are afriad we'll lose and eviction because the tenants are pathelogical liars!!!!... WAY TO GO JUDY NICASTRO ! If you're so committed to improving Seattle, why don't you buy a house here and invest in our community....instead of bringing your East coast logic to Seattle. I have worked really hard to buy a couple of house in Seattle, I pay tons of property taxes....I have to feed my rentals over a thousand dollars a month until they break even. I'm REALLY FRUSTRATED with a system than totally benefits this transient population.


David Ball-Romney	Oct 06, 2004	Seattle	executive
As of this writing , the Seattle Police still do not seem to know of their role in enforcing the laws protecting tenants. However, if you go to a Precinct desk officer, or if necessary contact the Department of Neighborhoods (or the Mayor's office) you can actually get the police to file a report sometimes. The desk officer who did this for me (when I presented him with a printout of SMC 22.202.010:[MORAL: ONLY GET LEGAL ADVISE FROM AN ATTORNEY ~ I AM NOT AN ATTORNEY, SO WHAT I SAY HEREIN IS NOT LEGAL ADVISE] SMC 22.202.010 Enforcement authority -- Rules. A. Enforcement. The Director is hereby designated the City Official to exercise the powers granted by this Code, except that the Chief of Police is authorized to administer and enforce Sections 22.206.180 and 22.206.190 and shall have equal authority with the Director for enforcement of SMC Sections 22.206.140 and 22.206.160 B3. In enforcing SMC Sections 22.106.180 and 22.206.190 , the Chief of Police shall encourage any owner(s) and tenant(s) involved to engage in mediation or binding arbitration pursuant to RCW 59.18.315 through RCW 59.18.350 of the State Residential Landlord Tenant Act to resolve outstanding disputes between them. RIGHT TO PRIVATE ACTION (SMALL CLAIMS COURT ETC.) SMC 22.206.305 Tenant's private right of action. Nothing in this Code is intended to affect or limit a tenant's right to pursue a private right of action pursuant to Chapter 59.18 RCW for any violation of Chapter 59.18 RCW for which that chapter provides a private right of action. When an owner commits an act prohibited by SMC Sections 22.206.180 A1, 22.206.180 A2, or 22.206.180 A7, a tenant has a private right of action against the owner for actual damages caused by the prohibited act. To the extent that actual damages are unliquidated or difficult to prove, a court may award liquidated damages of up to One Thousand Dollars ($1,000.00) instead of actual damages. Such damages when awarded are to be on a per incident, rather than a per tenant basis. The prevailing party in any such action may recover costs of the suit and attorney fees. REMEMBER THAT CITY OFFICIALS WHO ARE NOT ATTORNEYS DO NOT NECESSARILY KNOW THE LAW -- HOW COULD A NON-LAWYER HAVE A VALID LEGAL OPINTION? It's a good thing to presume that the property-owner is up to something -- is retaliating -- if eviction proceedings commence after an inspection from the Department of Planning and Development (formerly DCLU) because a property owner who initially refuses to do repairs for a period substantial enough to require government involvement is, from my experience, HOSTILE to the idea of effecting the repairs. Having to answer to the City tends to make some of them more HOSTILE! Our US Constitution prohibits the government from bestowing titles of nobility, yet our State government calls rental property-owners landLORDS. These people are not LORDS! Though some of them act like it when tenants inform them that tenants have rights!!! Some of these 'lords' feel quite put out when they discover that the 'non-lords' have rights. Renters typically don't like the idea of paying for someone else's mortgage; why making it worse by having renters have to answer to a 'lord'?


Jim Johnston	Apr 18, 2005	Washington	Observer
best to Mr. Ball-Romney on his many endeavors as so far he has "proof in the pudding" a phrase often used when trying to convince the government of things they already know they are doing illegally but yet against the law is to be morally right in to many cases and this must stop. We are a society of money and short on compassion.