Tacoma committee sends Landlord Fairness Code changes to council after hearing nonprofit and landlord concerns

The Community Vitality and Safety Committee voted Nov. 6 to forward proposed amendments to Tacoma's Landlord Fairness Code Initiative (LFCI) to the full City Council and asked staff to draft ordinance language defining "undue and significant economic hardship," clarifying a "small landlord" exemption, and adding standards and accountability for selling a unit and for owner-or-family occupancy.

The committee's action followed nearly an hour of public comment from nonprofit affordable-housing providers, tenant advocates and small landlords. Amanda Deshay, executive director of the Tacoma Pierce County Affordable Housing Consortium, told the committee she supported exempting nonprofit affordable housing from the LFCI and described a case Mercy Housing Northwest reported in which a tenant allegedly flooded units multiple times and the organization reported roughly $800,000 in damages and related costs. "Please consider exempting affordable housing from LFCI," Deshay said.

April Black, executive director of the Tacoma Housing Authority, said the agency had seen a jump in delinquencies since the measure passed, saying 40% of its tenants were more than 30 days behind on rent compared with about 15% in 2019, and reported more than $530,000 in delinquent rent currently on the authority's books. Black told the committee that those delinquencies were delaying conversion of a recent project from construction…