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Committee advances ordinance to align rental-license fines with health-code penalties
Summary
Denver’s Finance & Business Committee heard a proposal to amend the residential rental licensing code to allow civil penalties up to $5,000 per violation per day, aligning Excise & Licenses’ maximum with the Department of Public Health & Environment. Supporters said the change will deter large bad-actor landlords; landlord groups warned small owners could be disproportionately harmed. The committee voted to advance the measure to full council.
Denver — The Finance & Business Committee on Oct. 28 advanced an ordinance that would allow the Department of Excise and Licenses to assess civil penalties of up to $5,000 per violation per day for residential rental-license violations, aligning the licensing code’s maximum with penalties already available to the Department of Public Health and Environment (DDPHE).
The ordinance would add a new section to Article 8 of Chapter 27 of the Denver Revised Municipal Code specifying that violations are subject to a civil penalty not to exceed $5,000 per violation per day, that citations may be cumulative, and that the city may place a lien against property for unpaid penalties. Staff said the change would be applied in a scaled enforcement model that begins with warnings and progresses to higher fines only after repeated noncompliance or for particularly egregious violations.
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