Hearing Rigged Against Small Landlords
After voters statewide strongly rejected rent control in 1994, tenant groups have been pushing hard for its resurrection, getting far enough to have a major hearing on several bills on Beacon Hill last week. As I’ve written here before, economists have universally concluded that rent control does not work, and in many cases, it has actually resulted in higher rents overall. But that has not stopped tenant groups like City Life/Vida Urbana from pushing this failed policy and using their clout to get lawmakers to jump on the rent control bandwagon.
The best evidence of how lawmakers are kowtowing to these groups is the travesty which transpired at the State House hearing on Jan. 14. The hearing lasted for 6.5 hours at which landlords were given only 15 minutes of speaking time. That’s not even 4% of the total hearing time. While representatives from the GBREB spoke first for about 10 minutes, the remaining six plus hours was a cattle call of tenant groups, paid housing lobbyists, affordable housing advocates, and public housing reps, advocating rent control and increased transfer and property taxes to subsidized their rents.
According to Doug Quattrochi, the Executive Director of MassLandlords, the largest statewide property owner trade association, the hearing was essentially rigged in favor of tenants. He said that legislators intentionally controlled the order of speakers to freeze out small landlords and property owners. There was a small army of small landlords who showed up early at 9AM, but were not allowed to speak at all, even though the hearing went until 6PM.
The implementation of rent control would cost Massachusetts rental property owners literally billions of dollars, and the best that Legislature can do is give them 15 minutes of speaking time?
This is outrageous.
If you feel so inclined, please email the members of the Joint Committee on Housing.
