They Don't Want Your Help

I didn't have to hide any shock yesterday when Oshkosh City Manager Mark Rohloff told me that very few people are allowing inspectors inside their units for mandatory rental inspections this year.  That's because it doesn't surprise me in the slightest.  Of the 300 or so inspection conducted since they started in September, just 35 have seen the city worker actually go inside the unit.  The rest have been conducted from outside the building.  For those mathematically challenged, that is a real inspection rate of just 12-percent.

Initially, City Manager Rohloff blamed landlords for this low inspection rate--saying they were "spreading lies" about the process and scaring their tenants into refusing entry to inspectors.  But the reality may be sinking in that those renters don't want the City's "help"--especially in the area where officials have targeted for the first round of inspections: the Central City and University neighborhoods.

For many renters in that area, their unit is a "residence of last resort" if you will.  They can't afford or can't get approved to rent an apartment in a "better part of town"--so they congregate in areas with older, more run-down housing.  But if the city requires landlords to spruce up the appearance of the buildings and fix the myriad of issues with the units, they suddenly become more valuable--and the tenant runs the risk of being priced out of the one home they could barely afford.  This is part of what "social justice warriors" call "gentrification"--where minority neighborhoods are "fixed up" and suddenly become a haven for higher-earning young whites looking for trendy, new places to live--and then they take over the available housing stock--driving out the original minority residents.

And while city officials insist that anything they see that might be illicit or illegal they are not going to report to police, a lot of these folks just plain aren't going to believe that.  When you have illegal drugs, stolen goods, weapons, unauthorized pets, tenants that aren't on the lease, garbage you are too lazy to throw out, hoarded items and damage that you yourself caused that you know you should be charged for, you want as few people as possible knowing about it.  The same goes for those who are wanted on arrest warrants--or who have outstanding debts or child support payments.  In fact, an "absentee landlord" is what you want.  I was only half-joking when I suggested to the City Manager that we cross-reference the list of people that signed the petitions to lower the fine for marijuana possession with the list of tenants that have rejected an internal inspection.

Oshkosh leaders have fallen into the same trap that the supporters of the Affordable Care Act fell into when they insisted that requiring health insurance would mean everyone would rush out to get health insurance that had never been able to get it before: there are large numbers of people who do not want--nor can they afford--the Government's "help".