Kentucky state lawmakers are closer to outlawing two local ordinances that ban landlords from refusing to rent to someone based solely on the use of housing assistance income, like Section 8.
Likely to become law pending final passage in the House, House Bill 18 would prohibit cities and counties from adopting – or enforcing, in the case of Louisville and Lexington, which now have ordinances in place – any local law that prevents landlords and property managers from “refusing to lease or rent the housing accommodation to any person when the person’s lawful source of income to pay rent includes funding from a federal housing assistance program.”
House Bill 18 passed the Senate 25-11 on Tuesday, less than a week after passing the Senate State and Local Government committee. The bill passed the House 74-20 on Jan. 23. It is similar to Senate Bill 25, which passed the Senate last month.
The second part of the short one-and-a-half-page bill would prohibit landlords from being held financially responsible for tenant ambulance bills or other emergency service fees. Lawmakers have been fairly quiet on that issue. The debate on the federal housing assistance provisions in the Senate on Tuesday was more animated – with Lexington’s new ordinance central to the debate.
Last Thursday, Lexington became the second city in Kentucky to pass a so-called “source of income ban” prohibiting landlords from refusing to rent to someone based solely on their use of federal vouchers or other federal assistance. Louisville passed its ordinance in 2020.
Senate Majority Floor Leader Damon Thayer (R-Georgetown) told the Senate that Lexington’s ordinance requires private landlords to accept Section 8 housing vouchers at “below market rate.”
“You better believe this is a response to what they’re doing in Lexington,” he said Tuesday. “What’s happened in Lexington is discrimination against the free market and men and women who are in the business of being landlords and renting property. The (Lexington urban county government) is trying to dictate to them how much money they should take for their rentals.”
Proponents of the bans say landlords are not required to rent to anyone based on source of income or any other reason. The ban, they say, prohibits landlords from using source of income as a reason not to rent or lease.
Landlords are allowed to screen potential tenants based on their ability to pay security deposits or other tools, according to Bill Hollander, a former Louisville metro council member who helped pass Louisville’s source of income ban in 2020.
“No landlord is required to change those criteria or their properties because of Louisville’s source of income ordinance, and repeated assertions to the contrary in Frankfort are simply false,” Hollander said in a Jan. 22 Courier Journal editorial.
Supporters of source of income bans also note that the Section 8 program –a federal housing voucher program that authorizes rent payments to private landlords for low-income tenants – is voluntary. Landlords are not required to participate in it.
“Nothing in Louisville’s ordinance requires a landlord to lease to individuals using Section 8 vouchers,” Louisville Democrat Tina Bojanowski said during the Jan. 23 House vote on HB 18.
In Covington, the city has supported the Section 8 housing program for years. In a statement to LINK nky Tuesday, Covington Neighborhood Services director Brandon Holmes said there is a need for more participation in the Section 8 program (also called the Housing Choice Voucher program) today.
“The Housing Choice Voucher program is the nation’s largest rental assistance program that assists over 2.2 million families annually, with nearly 1,050 individuals receiving assistance in Kenton County at any given time. There is surely a need for more Housing Choice Voucher landlords in Covington and through the entire United States,” Holmes told LINK nky.
Listings for two-bedroom condos in Newport’s luxury riverfront housing complex Ovation went up on Zillow this week, with purchase prices starting at $975,000. Nearby on 5th Street, an apartment complex called The Cadence of Newport has two-bedroom apartments listed for $1,495 per month. Yet, many in the community still remember the apartments by their former name, Victoria Square, which used to charge only $710 per month for an apartment.
In short, recent discussions have taken a pessimistic tone: On the ground, it seems to many that there’s an overabundance of newer, higher-end luxury developments while smaller and more accessible forms of housing appear to be drying up.
Although there are some exceptions, broadly speaking, these worries have a basis in reality. In fact, for many, finding secure, affordable housing has become more and more of a challenge. Click here to read more.
Understanding NKY’s housing shortage
“At any given time, we have nearly 200 families locally with approved vouchers in Kenton County searching for housing. Like most communities, Covington seeks to boast a variety of housing types at various price points, and desires to be an inclusive and welcoming city for all,” he said. Covington has not passed a source of income ban.
Before the House passed the bill on Jan. 23. Rep. Ryan Dotson called HB 18 necessary to stop what he called “blatant overreach of the local government in Fayette County and currently in Jefferson County (from) forcing individual property owners to take Section 8 and other government housing.” Dotson (R-Winchester) is the lead sponsor of the bill.
Dotson, whose district includes part of Fayette County, called HB 18 a “property rights bill” he said is designed to protect capitalism.
“Property ownership is a basic tenet of capitalism and protecting those rights are vital to every one of us,” Dotson told the House. “I’m all about local control. My voting record reflects that. But this is where we as a body should draw a line in the sand because this is not truly a local control issue, it’s a property rights issue.”
On Tuesday, Senate Minority Whip David Yates (D-Louisville) disagreed with some arguments made for HB 18 during the day’s floor debate. He said it’s “not true” that landlords have to accept less than they are asking in rent under the source of income bans now in place. If property rents for $2100 a month and someone has a voucher for $2000, a landlord is not required to accept that tenant, said Yates.
Before the bill passed the Senate, SB 25 lead sponsor Sen. Stephen West (R-Paris) brought the issue back to property rights. HB 18, he said, returns to the “status quo.”
“The main gist of the bill is, we’ve got to remember whose property we’re talking about. This is not the city of Louisville’s property. This is not the city of Lexington’s property. This is the landlord’s property,” said West.
Rebecca Hanchett is LINK nky’s Frankfort correspondent. You can reach her at rhanchett@linknky.com