City officials review effort to educate landlords on low income-tenant discrimination ban

A city law banning discrimination against people with low-income housing vouchers has produced few complaints since it took effect last September, likely because of low awareness combined with a tight rental market in Spokane.

The law prohibits landlords in the city of Spokane from discriminating against tenants based on, among other things, their source of income. It’s designed to protect tenants who receive a federal rental subsidy through a program that’s often called Section 8.

Alex Liberman, who runs the county’s Section 8 program at Spokane Housing Authority, said his office did get more landlords contacting him after the ordinance’s passage, wondering how to get the word out that they would accept housing vouchers.

“There seems to be more properties that we’ve been able to put out there as potential affordable housing units. Now, whether they have vacancies, that’s another issue all together,” Liberman said.

Violations of the ordinance have to be reported via a complaint form on the city’s website, and the city forwards them to the Northwest Fair Housing Alliance for investigation.

Terri Anderson, director of the Spokane Tenants Union, said tenants do not have much incentive to submit complaints, since the complaint will not fix the fact that they were not able to find an apartment.

“By the time somebody even realizes that ad is wrong, it’s probably already been rented out to someone that doesn’t have a voucher,” Anderson said.

There is funding in the city budget to address those reports, Kinder said: up to $7,000 a year for medication and $15,000 for investigation of complaints.

But, like Liberman, she said the bigger challenge facing renters is the lack of affordable housing. The city’s apartment vacancy rate is just 2.9 percent as of last fall, a slight improvement over 2016, but still low enough to drive prices up.

“We’ve got an incredibly tight housing market right now, and Title 18 doesn’t address that. It can’t,” Kinder said.

To make it easier for people with vouchers to find an apartment, Liberman’s office recently raised the value of the subsidy. For a one-bedroom apartment, a household can now receive up to $660, up from $620.

That figure includes utility payments, leaving the amount available for rent no more than $596, per federal guidelines. That’s below the average rate for a one-bedroom apartment, which is currently $750 according to Rent Cafe, a site that tracks rental prices in major cities.

Right now, Liberman said 413 households with rental vouchers are out looking for apartments. That’s up from 320 last May, but down from a peak of 474 in September.

“There’s really nowhere to place a voucher even if you get one,” said Marley Hochendoner, executive director of the housing alliance.

Among landlords, the ordinance has mostly been a nonissue.

Roger Trainor, executive director of the Landlord Association of the Inland Northwest, said most of his contact with landlords has been clarifying what it actually covers.

The ordinance doesn’t require landlords to rent to people with vouchers; it just states they have consider the applicants with vouchers alongside other tenants. Landlords can reject tenants who do not meet their screening criteria, whether they have a voucher or not.

“They thought is was much more involved than what it actually is,” Trainor said.

Kinder said she expects complaints to pick up as awareness of the ordinance grows, especially now that the city has resources to investigate. Their general policy is to educate landlords to correct violations.

She also said anyone, not just prospective tennants, can report violations.

“Case managers, medical professional, social workers, all of those people can file complaints,” Kinder said.

This article was updated to correct the agency that runs the Section 8 program. It is Spokane Housing Authority, not SNAP.