The Missoula City Council voted unanimously Monday at its regular meeting to adopt the “voluntary residential inspection program.” With one abstention from Ward 5 Councilwoman Renee Mitchell, the group also unanimously supported related fees and an inspection checklist.
The program came about because too many people have lived in or seen others live in unsafe homes, especially rental units, in Missoula. It's designed to give tenants a chance to make sure basic safety measures are in place.
So for $15, tenants can pay a city building inspector to make sure things like smoke detectors and safe wiring are present. Homeowners, landlords and property managers can volunteer for inspections, too.
A landlord would pay $15 for the inspection of one unit and $30 each for additional ones. In return, that landlord would be able to advertise that the units passed muster.
Building Department building official Don Verrue said the city is on the hunt for an inspector. That person will look for a few things, like signs of visible water damage, electrical hazards, shared forced-air heating and cooling systems, smoke detectors, window wells and egress windows, stairway rises and runs, leaking plumbing fixtures and handrails and guardrails.
Shared air systems can mean shared bacteria - and also shared disaster if one unit catches fire and the air system sends the problem to the next unit, Verrue said.
Window wells and egress windows in basement apartments mean tenants have an escape route. Verrue also said the city will accept an egress window from the 1940s, even though it's different than the ones built these days.
Water damage, another problem, points to the possibility of mold, which can be hazardous to health. The Health Department's Gilman said the number of people calling about mold problems has steadily gone up over the years. Since 2001, she's gotten at least 120 calls, and that's after the problem has gotten serious.
Gilman said water damage in leaking plumbing almost always translates into mold. It's a known allergen, a trigger for asthma and over time, it damages the lungs, she said.
“No matter how much they clean, if the water leak isn't fixed, the mold is going to continue to proliferate,” Gilman said.
When people ask Gilman for information, she's given them hotline numbers for landlord-tenant relations and legal services. But she said the people making those calls don't always get the results they want.
“I think the need is so great that often they're not getting called back. And they're so frustrated, they're just so frustrated,” Gilman said.
She said the new program will let tenants ask for an inspection, and then negotiate with the property manager, for instance, if something needs fixing.
Some onlookers don't believe the program will take off right away, but they're gearing up for the change anyway. The Associated Students of the University of Montana Off-Campus Renter Center and city of Missoula Building Department both plan to spend time teaching people about how they can put the new inspector to work.
“At first, we're not expecting much of a demand. But the main focus at first will be education,” said building official Verrue.
He said that means setting up booths at Southgate Mall and at the University Center and reaching people by radio and television.
The Building Department isn't technically adding a position for the program - it's incorporating the duties related to the program into an existing job. Verrue said that means the new plan won't cost the department more money, but the general fund will reimburse the cost of activities that aren't related to building inspections. He didn't know how much reimbursement to expect this first year.
At the ASUM Off-Campus Renter Center, director Denver Henderson said the program means he can ethically recommend property management companies to students and others once inspections begin. He estimates some 10,000 UM students rent off campus.
“It's funny, it's not just students stopping in. I get calls from parents,” Henderson said.
And he said they ask much the same question: “Where can I find quality, affordable housing?”
He'd like to be able to point them in the right direction fairly quickly.
“I'm hoping that we'll be able to have an initial set of units that have been inspected and certified for the fall semester,” he said.
Henderson said he expects the program to get off to a slow start because people at first will be reluctant to have their units inspected. At the same time, he believes momentum for it will build over time.
“In latter years, this should be a market-driven program,” he said.
He also wanted to remind people that renters have a right to safe housing, and they, too, pay property taxes. The rent is calculated in a way that includes property taxes, he said, and it's one of the first things people learn in property management classes. More than half of the population in Missoula rents, he said.
“Renters play a very important role in our economy and in our society, in Missoula's society,” he said.
While council unanimously backed the ordinance, it isn't wholly supported outside chambers. The Missoula Organization of Realtors remains neutral but is actively supporting residential safety, said Ruth Link, MOR public affairs director.
She said MOR is donating 100 carbon monoxide detectors to the program, so the first 100 people who don't already have one in place will get one as part of their inspection.
“We kind of figured we wanted to do our part to support the realistic safety concerns that are out there,” Link said.
Proponents, though, are already looking at how to expand the ordinance later on. Ward 4 Councilman Jon Wilkins said he wants to make sure the person who is hired is qualified to run the program, because the city isn't advertising for that part of the job. He said the advertisement went out before the council adopted the program.
Wilkins, who pushed the idea along in part because his brother-in-law died after falling outside an unsafe unit, also said he would like to change a state law that prohibits the inspections from being mandatory.
“And it should be mandatory,” Wilkins said.
Reporter Keila Szpaller can be reached at 523-5262 or at Keila.Szpaller@missoulian.com.
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