Legitalk:

[Rep. [Unidentified] (possibly 'Corpus')]: Where is it?

[Rep. Geoff Luxenberg, House Chair (Housing Committee)]: I'm just quickly gonna call this housing meeting to order and immediately recess for about fifteen minutes. Thank you, everybody. Alright. We're gonna open this meeting of the housing committee. Welcome everybody. It's, another good day to have a good day. Let's not, you know, hold anybody on ceremony. Any remarks from my senate ranking or my rankings? And, cochair is in a press conference, so folks will be in and out as we go. We're gonna skip over item number one for now. Go to item number two, enact concerning provisions and residential rental agreements. Is there is there a motion?

[Sen. Rob Sampson, Senate Ranking Member (Housing Committee)]: Motion.

[Rep. Geoff Luxenberg, House Chair (Housing Committee)]: Moved and seconded. Any discussion?

[Rep. Tony Scott, House Ranking Member (Housing Committee)]: Yeah. Representative Scott. Thank you, mister chair. Appreciate it. Yeah. So so, Raffy had a good conversation yesterday about this bill. This is some of his stuff that we know, a good a good friend of the committee. I you know, I do have some questions on a few of these, and I can't wait to see the the language, one of which which is being disclosure of late fees. Like, I know we've had that conversation before, and I thought we've already passed something that did say, we have a disclosure of late fees. So I just I'm I'm interested in seeing, you know, verbally what we're talking about versus what's actually in the bill. That's why these are concepts. Just everyone reminder, where there are concepts, and this is where we're doing to have a public hearing, but also see the actual language as it gets printed out. And we can actually really get into the nitty gritty because the devil is always in that detail. So some of the questions I do have is about late fees or is it is it something we already have done, and a little bit more, around that. But, this is something that, again, we're willing to, do on a voice vote as, as, as we push on with, the rest of the agenda, but definitely have lots of questions as we get closer to the public hearing.

[Rep. Geoff Luxenberg, House Chair (Housing Committee)]: Thank you, representative. Senator Samson.

[Sen. Rob Sampson, Senate Ranking Member (Housing Committee)]: Good morning, Mr. Chairman. Thank you for the recognition. I'll just, you know, kind of follow-up on, what my, ranking member of the house, said, which is that, you know, we're voting on concepts today. I say this in every meeting we vote on concepts, which is that, you know, these are just an agreement to move forward with the idea, on any of these, bill proposals, a vote up or down on any one of them. Doesn't really indicate what you might do on the final product. Once we have bill language. Just speaking to item number two out of the gate. Well first before that, let me just say that, you know, I want to appreciate the chairman putting a number of Republican items on this agenda today. I always like when we can work together and start moving legislation that, is more likely to have bipartisan support and agreement. And, as a result, I think that this, committee meeting will go very well today, and probably more quickly than a typical housing committee meeting, which, people might be pleased at. But again, I do want to be clear that, you know, simply because we are going to work together and we're going to allow some, concepts that ultimately I don't see that I'm going to have much likelihood of supporting at the end of the day. But willing to have the conversation as long as the, the chairs are willing to have a conversation about some of our proposals as well. That's very fair. And I and I like to look at it in those terms. I'll just say a word about the item number two. It looks like three separate concepts. The first one being, prohibiting the use of a clause in a lease agreement that says that a landlord cannot, raise the rent based on the breach of a lease. I don't know if that really makes a lot of sense. I mean, once a, once a lease is broken, there is no lease anymore now. And now you have to worry about, how to rectify that, one party is, not following the contract. So I'm, I'm curious to hear what the ultimate proposal is. Disclosure of late fields and fees, I think is something that's already done. Certainly a lease agreement would have to state that to begin with, you wouldn't be able to collect late fees from a tenant unless you previously disclosed that as part of the agreement. And then finally, this is the part that puzzles me is this, prohibition on holdover clauses. This is the part of a lease agreement where somebody would sign to say that, you maybe the rent is 1,500 right now for this year, but if the lease renews, you can keep it at 1,600 a month, for example. These clauses typically benefit the tenant much more than the landlord. And usually they're included because the tenant wants to ensure that they have the option to continue to rent the place going forward. It for me, I mean, I if you take that away, I think what might happen is you might have landlords, that could, have an advantage over the negotiation process. I mean, a tenant is going to be living in the unit for a year or more, right. And they're going to have, stuff, right. They're gonna, they're gonna move in. And sometimes, I have some tenants, for example, that, boy, I if they had to move out in a short notice, it might be a very, you know, extreme difficulty for them and very expensive. So I, you know, I hate to, put a provision in, ref that would prevent the ability of the parties to negotiate those terms, especially if it ends up giving one, much more leverage than the other. I think that's why I'm I'm so hesitant, very often to, put things in our statute that would prohibit the fair negotiation of the parties. So I just wanted to put that on the record. But as, discussed, I will support this as a concept today. Thank you.

[Rep. Geoff Luxenberg, House Chair (Housing Committee)]: Thank you, senator. And to translate, some of his earlier comments, I think he's saying that the preliminaries are gonna go very short, but the title fights might go 12 rounds. Any objection to a voice vote? Seeing none, all those in favor signify by saying aye. Aye. All those against, nay. Ayes have it. Item number three, an act concerning domestic violence and tenant screening. This, proposal is, you know, once again, it's it's it's a concept. The concept is trying to figure out, how to bridge the gap between some tenants who have experienced domestic violence. Those tenants may, in many cases, because of the domestic violence they've experienced, also experience domestic violence that is done financially. Right? Financial abuse from, either a former spouse or a person that they were living with, and their credit scores will be very low. This would allow them to disclose, their status as somebody who was a victim of domestic violence in order to either, be forgiven on a bad credit check or to forego a credit check. Any, is there a motion? Motion.

[Sen. Rob Sampson, Senate Ranking Member (Housing Committee)]: Second.

[Rep. Geoff Luxenberg, House Chair (Housing Committee)]: Moved, seconded. Any discussion? Senator Samson.

[Sen. Rob Sampson, Senate Ranking Member (Housing Committee)]: Thank you, mister chairman. Just say a word about this one to enact concerning domestic violence and tenant screening. I get what the chairman is saying is that we wanna find a way to protect, victims of domestic violence, and I'm certainly sympathetic to that. The problem is that, you know, what this bill seems to be proposing is that we're going to require a housing provider ultimately to pick up the slack and, you know, offer, a more lenient screening process or reduced rent or something to make up for the, difficulties that that victim of domestic violence is going through. I just don't see it's their responsibility. If the state government feels like we wanna take care of the victims of domestic violence, I think that's great, and I think we should develop policies to do so. But to go ahead and put that on a innocent third party, like it's their problem now, especially when what you're also doing when you do that, and please don't forget this is now you're putting that person in an advantage over some other prospective tenant, you know, who might be eligible, including another person who might be a victim of domestic violence, who doesn't have bad credit or some other situation. I think it's very problematic when we misdirect how we're trying to help people. I'm super sympathetic to the victims of domestic violence. I want to help them, but I don't think this is the mechanism to do it. Thank you.

[Rep. Geoff Luxenberg, House Chair (Housing Committee)]: Thank you, senator. Any other questions or comments? Representative Gonzales?

[Rep. Minnie Gonzalez]: Good morning, mister chair. What maybe I'm a little bit confused, but I would like to know. I wanna be sure that what he says is if I'm a landlord and I have a tenant that is going through domestic violence, that means that me as a landlord are gonna be responsible for the rent. It's gonna be on me?

[Rep. Geoff Luxenberg, House Chair (Housing Committee)]: This has nothing to do with the payment of the rent. This is just the way that you would screen a a credit background check.

[Rep. Minnie Gonzalez]: This is only for credit background check?

[Rep. Geoff Luxenberg, House Chair (Housing Committee)]: Yeah. Not the not actual not actually affecting the the rental payment itself. No.

[Rep. Minnie Gonzalez]: Okay. Thank you.

[Rep. Geoff Luxenberg, House Chair (Housing Committee)]: Thank you, representative. Any any opposition to creating a consent calendar? Any objection to this item number three going on consent? No. Understood. Understood. Understood. Okay. Sure. Alright. We're gonna we're instead, because I know that there are some folks who who may have opposition to a number of these bills, and we don't wanna put every concept as a as a yes for everybody. We're going to discuss each item one by one, and we are going to vote on every item at the end of the agenda. Item number four, an act concerning the income threshold for tenants renting a dwelling unit in a set aside development. This is an item we've had for a number of years. It is basically trying to figure out folks who might graduate from being eligible for these, for renting these developments, and they'll get a a certain subsidy, and then all of a sudden you make $5,000 more. You're not eligible for it anymore there, but you don't have anywhere to go. Right? It's not like you immediately, have new prospects. It's it's not like, what we see a lot in this rental, market is not going from, a small nominal amount that you're paying to something much larger. It's a it's a big step for people to take. We wanna give them some leeway to do it a couple of years. I know that there have been some technical issues with this bill in the past. I see our friends from in the back. We'll do our best to work on those with you. But the same way that we do this for, let's say, Alliance District funding in schools where you have a three year probationary period where you get off of Alliance District funding or eligibility for Alliance District funding, and, if you go back on in those three years, no harm, no foul, Same thing here. We just wanna give people the leeway to to get their stuff together. Any questions or comments? Representative Scott.

[Rep. Tony Scott, House Ranking Member (Housing Committee)]: Thank you, mister chair. Yeah. We have had this, conversation, I think, for the last two sessions, and I do think it's something that is viable to have a conversation on. I do think there's some logistical problems that we need to work through. We haven't been able to work through them, and I think it's something that we need to either figure out or, unfortunately, might not be able to to live past this year or even to have any more conversations on. I do like the idea of having a runway, allowing folks to be able to get a raise and make a little bit more money, but not necessarily immediately have to be their their lease is coming due in the next couple months and at least, you know, then they have to be booted out because they now make beyond the threshold of that that that that unit. I I I I like that I concept idea. I just don't know how we can make it work. Not all the time great ideas can actually be put to to put to law, you know, and and, unfortunately, this might be one of those. So, I I appreciate that you bring it up. We'll have further conversations about a public hearing on it, and let's see if we can work something out. If not, then, unfortunately, this might not be something we'll be able to to also move forward down, and actually pass. So but I appreciate the conversation on it. Thank you.

[Rep. Geoff Luxenberg, House Chair (Housing Committee)]: Any other questions, comments? Alright.

[Rep. Tony Scott, House Ranking Member (Housing Committee)]: Item number six. I don't know

[Rep. Geoff Luxenberg, House Chair (Housing Committee)]: if you got it

[Rep. Tony Scott, House Ranking Member (Housing Committee)]: in front of me. Yeah.

[Rep. Geoff Luxenberg, House Chair (Housing Committee)]: Item number six. I'm just gonna jump around a little bit here, guys. Don't worry. We'll get to everything. Enacting increasing how housing unit equivalent points for municipalities. This is a few provisions. One of them is a raise in the housing unit equivalent points across the board for all affordable units. That could be elderly units. That could be set aside units. Anything that that qualifies for housing unit equivalent points now, we're just kinda upping the score a little bit. We recognize, I think as as most of us in this community recognize, that the way that to get to your eight thirty g moratorium is kinda set in stone in a way that's a little broken with the the denominator. You build a 100 units, 90 towards ninety ninety go towards your denominator, 10% go against it because, obviously, you're adding more volume to your housing stock. So this is a way to to kinda solve for that as we also, later in this agenda, will speak about getting into talking about what the denominator looks like and making it fair for everybody to be able to reach their affordable housing goals. Any questions, comments? Representative Scott.

[Rep. Tony Scott, House Ranking Member (Housing Committee)]: I appreciate this. This is, especially for those who are getting close or coming up close to, hitting their moratorium. This could be something that could be very advantageous towards them. This is a carrot, not a stick. You know, while I would love to get rid of all of this, you know, in in theory, I understand that's not that's not happening, but I do understand that the, you know, we're trying to push some specific types of housing and this is a great way to do it by offering those municipalities ability to build more of that housing, but also get credit for it as we're trying to build that either 2%, growth or the enough few points to be able to qualify for that moratorium. So, I'm I'm appreciative of this as a as a carrot and, hopefully, this is something that we can work forward and move, out of this committee. Representative Corpus.

[Rep. [Unidentified] (possibly 'Corpus')]: Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I wanted to echo those comments. I'm appreciative of this, attempt and effort to make eight thirty gs more workable. I don't agree with it, and nor do I did I support the housing bill which passed. But another really good thing about this initiative is that if towns end up with a fixed number to, under the fair share parts of their 8,002 allocation, and then this becomes an actual number instead of a 10% threshold, then it'll reduce confusion and towns will have more certainty about what they're shooting for. So I really appreciate that this is getting consideration this year. Thank you.

[Rep. Geoff Luxenberg, House Chair (Housing Committee)]: Thank you. Any other questions or comments? Seeing none, we will move on to item number nine, enact establishing a medical respite pilot program. This is what it says. It's for folks who are dealing with various medical issues or, you know, dealing with in home care, establishing a pilot program to to give them a little bit of relief for their housing. Any questions, comments? Seeing none, we'll go to number 10, an act concerning tiered deed restrictions. This is something of a a personal project of mine. I think we've heard a lot from a lot of folks about the way the deed restriction works, especially being forty years. Forty years is a very, very long time. But then I hear from from other folks who tell me they wanna do five years, and I think that's a little little ridiculous on the other end. But we should be able to tier it in a certain way, especially if you're thinking about, like, elderly units, for example. Maybe they don't need a forty year deed restriction if that's gonna end up being somewhere that that person moves on either into, you know, long term living or otherwise and giving giving that a little bit less of a of a hit and some other situations as well. So finding a way to tier deed restriction so that not everything has to be forty years. I don't think we're getting anything down to, you know, five, ten, but talking about between, you know, fifteen, twenty, forty is a conversation I think we ought to have. Any questions, comments, discussions? Seeing none. I'm not gonna describe the next one. I think I'm just gonna, let senator Samson, give his remarks, but number 11 is an act defining advanced rental payments. Senator Sams?

[Sen. Rob Sampson, Senate Ranking Member (Housing Committee)]: Thank you very much, mister chairman. Yeah. This, proposal is something that, I've put in the last several years, and it's designed to address a situation where you have a tenant and a housing provider in a negotiation. And very often you might, run across a tenant that may have maybe not continuous job history, or they have a credit issue, but they in other, ways, are a viable tenant applicant. And maybe as a landlord, you wanna give them a chance, but it's much more appealing if they would pay a larger amount upfront. And if the tenant sometimes will make that offer to you, it's, it seems silly to me that under current law that can't happen. So you have a guy that says, I want to rent your apartment. I know my credit's not so good, but I'm a good tenant. I'm trying to clean things up. I can pay you six months in advance and you're like, yeah, I, I, you know, I'd take a chance on you that maybe you're going to end up being a really good tenant. And that seems fair, but under our current law, that is a prohibited practice. To me, that's a mistake. I think we should be allowing those situations. Again, this is a situation where the tenant offers it. It's not where we're allowing the landlord to require that amount. It's just a situation where the tenant would, wanna engage in that. Plus, you know, I've had situations where you you have a tenant that might wanna go away. They're gonna leave the country, go back, you know, home to their native country or something like that for a few months. And they wanna just pay you, you know, to say, hey, by the way, I'm gonna be away. Can I just pay you for the next three months? And under our current statute, the landlords in violation of the law, if they accept that payment, it seems silly to me. There should be a way to, to work those things out. There is some conversation about making sure that we properly delineate security deposits from rental payments. And I think that that's very important because out there in the real world, sometimes people get confused. They can use their security deposit for the last month's rent, things like that. I think if we did a better job of drafting our statutes so that there's a clear, definitive, separation between a security deposit and rent, I think everyone benefits. And I just, urge adoption of the, proposal. Thank you, mister chairman.

[Rep. Geoff Luxenberg, House Chair (Housing Committee)]: Thank you, senator. Any other questions, comments? We'll move on. Item number 13, enact concerning notice to parties before rent fair rent commission. I'm just gonna look to my right to make sure I get this right. This would be ensuring that all parties are informed very basically of their rights. It would be a addition to a sheet that we commissioned DOH to give out that they can kind of put as a one pager on the table at a Fair Rent Commission meeting or, I guess, pop up on the screen if they're doing something via Zoom. But this this will be a, you know, prescriptive through DOH, but, describing what the rights are of each party before any Fair Rent Commission. Question, comments? Seeing none. Next is an act concerning the makeup of fair rent commissions. I think this is requiring that one third of the Fair Rent Commission be, property owners. And so some number. Yeah. Or or some number, obviously, is subject to change, but just to make sure that there is some property owner representation on Fair Rent Commission. Questions, comments, discussions? Seeing none. An act concerning utility charges for residential dwelling units. Any questions, comments, or discussions? Senator Sampson.

[Sen. Rob Sampson, Senate Ranking Member (Housing Committee)]: Thank you very much, mister chairman. I understand this is a proposal that comes to us from senator Looney, very similar to a bill we had last year. And I certainly understand that, he wants to make sure that, tenants are not overcharged for their utilities. I just think that in practice, this might ultimately harm tenants as well. You know, sometimes we, you know, we work on policy that is designed to achieve a stated purpose, but in practice, what happens is the work around that results out there after the bill is passed is something different. You know, I think that there are some situations where you might have a large building that does not have separate utilities for every individual unit. So landlords typically include the, electricity charge, for example, or heat and hot water. That is not usually to the benefit of the tenants because the landlord's gotta protect themselves. They wanna obviously collect more money than what the utility bill would be. So that's kind of built into that concept. In a smaller situation where someone's maybe renting an in law apartment, for example, and there's only one electric meter. I can see a landlord saying, look, I'll split the electric with you, you know, 50%, something like that. That creates an incentive for the tenant not to misuse their electricity either. So both the homeowner and the, the unit person, the tenant in the unit, they're both working collectively on trying to keep the electric bill down. If you create this situation where now the homeowner has got to include the electricity charges in the rent, they're going to charge more. You just know they are because now they're going to realize that the tenant has no incentive to keep the electric bill reasonable. They might just leave the heat on 85 or 90 degrees every day, you know, whatever. And, ultimately the landlord would be stuck with that. So they're going to build it into the rent. And that's my fear here is that while this might be good intentioned, I think what will happen in practice is that tenants will end up paying more, not less, for their utilities. And I just thought I'd put that on the record, mister chairman. Thank you.

[Rep. Geoff Luxenberg, House Chair (Housing Committee)]: Thank you, senator. Any other questions, comments, or discussions? Seeing none. Moving back. Item number one, enact to allow long term rental of a single bedroom in a single family home as of right. Are there any questions, comments, or discussions? Seeing none? And I'm really quickly go back to number five and go through number five. Give me one second. We'll we'll recess for a moment.

[Sen. Rob Sampson, Senate Ranking Member (Housing Committee)]: Yeah. I'm not coming to that shit, dude.

[Rep. Geoff Luxenberg, House Chair (Housing Committee)]: Sorry. The meeting will come back to order. We are still on number five. I was gonna give a little bit of a breakdown of what this is. It is the recommendations of the majority leaders roundtable. That is mostly correct as a title. I will say that any language fixes that are to be done to what was 8002 or any other language fixes such as in our middle housing bill a couple of years ago, We made it so that you can only accept either the middle housing housing equivalent points or the equivalent points you were getting. It was supposed to be additive. We're going to make it additive once again, along with a couple other concepts that I'll read off now. Well, the first one is that fix that I was speaking of. Then we'd have some some small eight thirty gs mortuary changes, shorter deed restrictions on municipally owned land, twenty year deed restriction rather than a forty year deed restriction. Sorry. Item number six on the list I'm looking at. Sorry. Item number so on number five, affordable housing land use appeals application records and expand reporting requirements in the categories of section eight thirty seven eight dash 37 b b. Questions? Comments? Representative Scott. Yes. Thank you so much.

[Rep. Tony Scott, House Ranking Member (Housing Committee)]: You were part of the, round table, so there's a lot of different discussions that came out of that came out of that, and I'm looking forward to so so a question I have, though, is there's we talked about twenty year deed restricted. There's another bill that we've already talked about or another concept in here. Are some of these broken out of these or, like, will I know we don't know at this point, but are we gonna try to keep them all together? Because I do see in the agenda today alone that there was, like, the tier d restriction was there. Is that something ultimately will be rolled into that language?

[Rep. Geoff Luxenberg, House Chair (Housing Committee)]: That that might be the case. We're not sure yet. I would say that this is a very specific case, but it could also be one of the tiers within tier deed restriction. Yeah. But they will come out separately. Representative Scott.

[Rep. Tony Scott, House Ranking Member (Housing Committee)]: Alright. Yeah. As always, we love to keep them as separate as possible because there's a lot of things we would vote I would vote yes on, that because there's some of these really good concepts, but when you put into a bigger build and maybe there's there's gonna be a no, then it stinks because there's a lot of good stuff potentially in the build I could support. So I'm always supportive of that. So appreciate. I know there's a lot of stuff that can go in here. We'll have many discussions about some of the tweaks that eight zero zero two that we talked about. Obviously, we're not saying get rid of eight zero zero two. That's not what we're saying. I'm saying is there some tweaks that we can definitely do that we definitely like to be able to make clear that we can do on, just cutting around the edges to make it a little bit smoother and and more clear what, what some of the meaning is on that. So I appreciate, this one, and, you know, I'll be supporting it today.

[Rep. Geoff Luxenberg, House Chair (Housing Committee)]: Thank you, representative. And just to be clear, when I say it can go into that, I meant the smaller concept into tier d restriction, not tier d restriction into this concept. Next would be item number seven, enact revising the housing statutes. Senate Dems priority. I think, they're trying to figure out how to revise the housing statutes. Any questions, comments, discussions? Representative Scott.

[Rep. Tony Scott, House Ranking Member (Housing Committee)]: Yeah. So this is where we're gonna get into, you know, it's a I guess it's a dummy concept at this point. It's words, and I we will see when the bill comes out. I had a frustration last year with five zero zero two when we had, like, you know, 20 or 30 words and it turned out to be a 100 page bill, when we left when they left the committee, so I'm interested in this one. We'll also talk about the same thing and the next one, just don't love the dummy concept. That's that's what this committee is for is you could work through it and have the conversations, have a public hearing on what you're actually trying to accomplish because whatever is going to be written in this is probably not going to be anything close what the bill is going to be trying to be when we get onto the floor of the house, because we're going to have a couple days to, you know, a week to be able to write this bill up and I'm assuming this one and the next one are gonna be fairly lengthy. So I I I do worry about that because that's what public hearing is for is to really understand and really look at the bill and understand what's in it. Pro, con, let us know. And sometimes when these happen, you you lose that, and I like to hear from the people, and I sit here and I'll sit here seven hours the other day. I'll sit here by twelve to fifteen hours next week and and I'll do the same thing because I wanna hear what everyone has to say, about the bills and I make my notes and help us with the negotiations and talk about what's actually happening with the bill. So, I just wanna call that out as a problem that I don't love this concept, because of the title, but we'll be pushing it through and we'll see what's actually in the bill when, it's actually written.

[Rep. Geoff Luxenberg, House Chair (Housing Committee)]: Thank you, representative. Any other questions, comments, discussions? Seeing none, move on to item number eight, an act concerning housing. This is a house priority. I will I will say that I share a different perspective. It's not that I don't, respect the perspective of the good representative to my right. At least for, this house proposal, I feel that it's the opportunity for us to really, really consolidate some stuff, really do some some things, a little bit more efficiently when we get to to floor time. Obviously, there comes a time where we go through these agendas and these titles cannot change. So all of a sudden, you'll see something that says enact to allow long term rental of a single bedroom. And if we throw, you know, tiered deed restriction in there, it doesn't really make much sense. So to be able to have a vehicle to put stuff in, I do not intend, at least in the house, to be putting any, concepts that we haven't given a a proper public hearing, but this is a a way to have a vehicle to put some things together. Any questions, comments, discussions? I think we heard them on the on the last one. Didn't. Item number 12, an act concerning housing unit equivalent points for development subject to litigation. Questions, comments, discussions? I will quickly describe. This is, something that we heard in the majority leaders roundtable, something that we definitely don't all agree on, but it would, make it so that if a eight thirty g application is fought in court and lost, the municipality that loses that suit would not be able to, collect housing unit equivalent points for that development. Questions, comments, discussions? Alright. Seeing none.

[Rep. Joe Zullo]: Mister chair, if I may very quickly, I'm sorry. I'm not doing well.

[Rep. Geoff Luxenberg, House Chair (Housing Committee)]: Representative Zulu, my my apologies.

[Rep. Joe Zullo]: Thank you very much. I appreciate it. Just very quickly, you mentioned there are people who have concerns about this. I'm certainly one of those people. You know, unfortunately, I see eight thirty g from the perspective that developers use it as a sword and a shield. And if we're gonna do this for municipalities, I think what's good for the goose is good for the gander. And, you know, frankly, if a developer has an application that's remanded by a court back to a a zoning board because there are concerns, right, then then the developer should have to pay for the town's legal fees for having to fight that because the court will have upheld those valid concerns. Again, what's good for the goose is good for the gander. And I think what you're gonna do if we see this move forward and it gets passed is that you're gonna see towns who are being severely penalized and and hurt by the fact that they that they can't appeal these decisions. You know? Unfortunately, a lot of times, developer developers bring these applications, and they they promise the world. And there really are engineering problems. There really are runoff problems. And and the court process allows for a fair process for towns to to weed those out and to actually get to projects that may not be, you know, well liked by everybody, but are are at least better than what was brought. And I think if we do this, then we're really putting towns in a bad spot. Obviously, willing to have the conversation. It came out of the roundtable. We need to have it, but I think we need to be very careful about it moving forward, and I appreciate the time.

[Rep. Geoff Luxenberg, House Chair (Housing Committee)]: Thank you, representative. Any other questions or comments? I'm good. Moving on to item number 16, an act concerning municipal right of first refusal. This comes from our House Republicans. It is allowing municipalities of first right of refusal to buy out and build affordable housing developments at something like 80% capacity. Questions, comments? Seeing none. Next is item number 17, enact incentivizing deeply affordable housing. Just the good representative who who gave us this proposal had it at something like $50,000 a year. Obviously, we're gonna convert that into some type of AMI to make sure that it keeps up with the way that the world moves, especially in terms of inflation, but just to provide some grant funding to folks who provide this kind of housing, this deeply affordable housing all across the state of Connecticut. Any questions, comments? Next, we talked about a little bit earlier. It's an act establishing an eight eight thirty g denominator working group. As we talked about before, the denominator right now is a percentage. And every time that you build more units, you're adding to the amount of units you have. Therefore, you're kinda moving the goalpost as we're going. As somebody who is, you know, in favor of how we have a 30 g now for the most part, I do think there can be changes that we make. I do see the the problem with that and and the problem with having goals that are not set in stone or in some places, some cases, not really achievable just based on the amount of volume that folks are gonna have to put up. So we just wanna start a working group, have that conversation. Questions, comments? Awesome. And number 19, an act concerning the property of evicted tenants. This is just looking into the municipal side of the deal. When it comes to the property of tenants who are evicted, folks are are left with that property. And it's my understanding now they have to go through a process where regardless of the value of the property, they're forced to auction it off. They're they're forced to keep it for a certain amount of days, and municipalities have come to us with complaints about how much of a burden that puts on them. I don't know how much I agree, but I'm definitely willing to have the conversation, which is why we're raising it here. Questions? Comments? Alright. Get a motion to raise items number one, three, four, five, six, seven, eight, nine, ten, eleven, twelve, thirteen, fourteen, fifteen, sixteen, seventeen, eighteen, and nineteen. So moved. Second. Moved and seconded. We already had our comments and discussions. Representative Scott.

[Rep. Tony Scott, House Ranking Member (Housing Committee)]: Real quick, we we did number two already, so I just wanna be very clear. Right? We're not skipping number two. We did two. That's why just so anyone who's listening, why we skipped two. We already did that one as a voice vote, so, that's why we did one through 19 minus number two. Just to

[Rep. Geoff Luxenberg, House Chair (Housing Committee)]: be clear. Yep. Any objection to a voice vote? All those in favor, signify by saying aye.

[Rep. [Unidentified] (possibly 'Corpus')]: Aye.

[Rep. Geoff Luxenberg, House Chair (Housing Committee)]: All those opposed, nay. The ayes have it. Can I have a motion to open the agenda and add item number 20, enact concerning squatter's rights?

[Rep. Minnie Gonzalez]: So moved.

[Rep. Geoff Luxenberg, House Chair (Housing Committee)]: Moved and seconded. This is a bill that we've had a couple of years. I'm going to give the same kind of parameters I gave last year. We need to make sure that we are protecting tenants. I know that we've gotten this we've had this discussion about very specific times where people have gone and had people stay at their at their units, and they go to kick them out, and now they have to go through a summary process eviction because this person says that they are a tenant. We need to make sure that we can prove whether folks are tenants or not. That works on both sides. If you're somebody who pays cash, there needs to be a way to, have a receipt or be able to show that you are a tenant. So somebody can't just say, they never paid me. We never had an agreement and get you kicked out that way. But on at the by the same token, I don't think somebody should have to go through the long slog of an eviction when somebody is is broken into and and, you know, use their property for their own purposes without being having any right to that property. Questions, comments? Senator Sampson?

[Sen. Rob Sampson, Senate Ranking Member (Housing Committee)]: Thank you, mister chairman. I just wanna thank you for putting this on the agenda. I I know this is a difficult, policy to come up with the language for, that's fair. And I think that's why we haven't been able to get something over the finish line in recent years. But I will say that this is a problem that is becoming more and more prevalent. I have somebody that I know personally, he's my barber actually. And, he owns a, an apartment building in the city of New Britain. And he told me a story about how he went over there to, make some repairs, to the building. And he found people living there and, they refused to leave, said, you know, you can't throw me out. You know, I'm, I'm living here, man. Sorry. And, so he calls the police like any of us would do. And the police came out and the police couldn't do anything. The, this, these folks said that they were, you know, paying, rent, to the landlord even though they weren't. And, I don't know end up how he ended up resolving it, but at the end of the day, I mean, that that that actually happened. I've seen this in the news a couple of times. I know that there are other members of this committee who've had some, individual experience on that subject. So I I do think it's important that we find a way to solve this problem. I do recognize that it is very difficult. We wanna make sure that we're not allowing some mechanism to, you know, evict a tenant that shouldn't be unfairly. And, I'm more than willing to to work with the chairs to kinda come up with the solution to that, but I really wanna protect property owners from having their, you know, their their homes taken from them effectively. So thank you very much for putting it on the agenda, mister chairman.

[Rep. Geoff Luxenberg, House Chair (Housing Committee)]: Thank you, Senator Sampson. Representative Gonzales.

[Rep. Minnie Gonzalez]: Thank you, mister chair. And sorry I was out, but, this is something that is very personal to me. I went through through a situation, and it was horrible. I thought that I was in a movie or something like that. I said, this is not possible. It's happening to me. I said, this is crazy. Then you go to your house and and and you tried to open it? Somebody is in inside trying you know, holding the door because they didn't want you to get into the door. And then the next thing that you heard it, you can't, you know, get out of my property before I called the cops. And I say, I'm crazy or what? This is my property. So, anyway, it was horrible. It took hours to deal with that. And I think that I was maybe one of the luckiest one here in Connecticut that I was able to get rid of them, like, in maybe four four, five hours. So because I heard cases that you have to pay them to move out of your property. So it's crazy. On the other hand, you know, I heard that what we have to protect, the tenant. What tenant? That person is not a tenant. That's in and in the property, that's not a tenant. And what we need, we have to protect their rights. What rights? What about my rights? Protect my right. I am the I am the landlord. I pay for the insurance. I pay for the mortgage. I pay for everything. And I don't have no right when, you know, you're in front of situation like that. So I hope that we can work this, you know, something out on this bill because I really want to see this happening. And I I I appreciate all the support in this. Thank you.

[Rep. Geoff Luxenberg, House Chair (Housing Committee)]: Thank you, representative. And just to just clarify, because I know, representative, senator Sampson and I were agreeing on this point. We talk about protecting tenants. We're talking about protecting tenants in other situations where folks may try to claim they're a squatter when they're not, not the the the people who are squatting themselves. And just to reiterate, beef yeah. Before we no. We don't wanna shoot the squatter. Just the bears. But, no, I'd I'd I just wanna make it clear to everybody that, the intent here is not to create another loophole trying to close this one. We need to figure out something that works for everybody, but willing to have that conversation with anybody who wants to come to the table from either side. Is there a motion or sorry. Are are you at a motion to raise? Any objection to a voice vote? All those in favor signify by saying aye.

[Sen. Rob Sampson, Senate Ranking Member (Housing Committee)]: Aye.

[Rep. Geoff Luxenberg, House Chair (Housing Committee)]: Supposed, nay. Ayes have it. Nice to see you, Larry. Next is, items to reserve for subject matter public hearing. And this is a a bill we had last year. I think it's just important for us to to hear it again to kinda get into it because I think there were paths to us agreeing on this bill, but we didn't quite get there last year. So it's an act exempting the income of up to $100,000 earned by a child under the age of 24 from inclusion in the parent's gross income for the determination of the parent's eligibility to participate in the rental assistance or wrap program. Obviously, you know, gotta do the subject matter based on the title, but if anything does come with this, that 100,000 is obviously not set in stone. Any questions, comments? Senator Sampson.

[Sen. Rob Sampson, Senate Ranking Member (Housing Committee)]: Thank you very much, mister chairman. I know I said I was gonna support all the items on this agenda, and I and I will stick to that, for, this idea of of moving forward with a public hearing. But, I gotta say, this is quite the objectionable, proposal. I mean, basically, what this says is that you could have someone living in your home with you who makes a $100,000 or more, and yet you'll still be eligible for government assistance. I I know countless, seniors on, Social Security income that are struggling to pay their rent and their electric bills and their medications and everything else. I mean, this this, to me, just is a slap in the face of people that are struggling to get by. I don't know what the right amount is. I in my view, it's 0. But I certainly hope it doesn't end up being a 100,000. I just wanted to get that on the record, mister chairman.

[Rep. Geoff Luxenberg, House Chair (Housing Committee)]: Thank you, senator. Any other questions, comments? Seeing none, any objection to a voice vote? All those in favor signify by saying aye. Aye. All opposed? You guys have it. Any closing remarks? Alright. We're gonna recess until 01:00. Both will be kept open until then.

[Stacy (Committee Clerk)]: Sorry. Hello, How are you? Oh, I can make sure my sound is on. There we are. Today, it was all voice votes, and so this is this is just for attendance purposes. You can't hear me? Let me try to fix that. You can hear me now? Okay. Fantastic. Today was, it was all voice votes, and so this is just for attendance purposes. So I got you down. Awesome. Thank you so much. Stacy, I'm going over Hi.

[Sen. Saud Anwar]: This is senator Anwar. How are you?

[Stacy (Committee Clerk)]: How are you? Today was all voice votes, and so this was just for attendance purposes. So you're all set?

[Sen. Saud Anwar]: Okay. I vote, in favor.

[Stacy (Committee Clerk)]: Great. Thank you.

[Sen. Saud Anwar]: Thank you. Yeah.

[Stacy (Committee Clerk)]: Take care. Yeah. Alright, representative. So, today's all we're all voice votes. And so Sorry. It should be just for attendance purposes, but you're all set.

[Rep. Geoff Luxenberg, House Chair (Housing Committee)]: Alright. Sounds good. Thank you.

[Stacy (Committee Clerk)]: Yep. Thank you.

[Rep. Geoff Luxenberg, House Chair (Housing Committee)]: Yeah. Bye.