Subsequent to the HAA Board meeting of 8/26/99, Sam Alpert instructed Larry Winn, III of Polsinelli, White, Vardeman & Shalton to prepare and submit a draft position paper on pending Overland Park, KS rental unit regulation for the association’s review. The Overland Park City Council has been preoccupied in recent weeks with a number of issues, which have temporarily diverted their attention from this issue while we await Mr. Winn’s submission.

Meanwhile, as determined at the HAA Board meeting of 8/26/99, Joe Mulvihill of Mulvihill & Hunter has been engaged by the HAA to provide counsel and representation as necessary to respond to pending rental unit regulation in Independence, MO. With Mr. Mulvihill’s assistance, Sam Alpert has been introduced to the public / private committee established by the City Council to refine and generate workable recommendations. The committee is comprised of two city councilmen (Don Reimal and Al Van Iten), city staff, and small landlords. Larry Kaufman, Special Projects Manager for the City Manager is the committee’s facilitator. David Rogers, owner of Remax Hidden Creek, has been the most persuasive opponent of interior inspections, while Councilman Reimal strongly advocates inspections of all rental units, and Bill Moore, City Attorney, is pressing to require that all rental property owners obtain business occupational licences.

To date the committee has agreed in principle to the following elements:

1. Property owners to obtain business occupational licenses ( based on voluntary annual declaration of gross receipts with a $25 minimum assessment)
2. Local registered agent for purposes of rapid response (primarily for maintenance calls Vs legal service)
3. No interior inspections except in response to tenant complaint
4. Enforcement of exterior property maintenance code for all classes of property (to include owner occupied residences, as well as commercial and industrial properties…..test programs have already been undertaken)
5. Third (3^rd) reinspection of a property for any given code violation will result in a $45 charge
6. A standing Property Maintenance Codes Advisory Committee appointed by the City Council comprised of councilpersons, city staff, and landlords

As of this writing, Councilman Reimal is still pushing for a broader interior inspection requirement than has been acceptable to the committee as a whole. Further discussion on this issue was to take place during the week of September 27^th. Final recommendations will be submitted to the City Council the first week in October, at which time public testimony will be taken.

Amended September HAA Legislative Activity Report

September 29, 1999

On September 28^th the Independence rental unit advisory committee met to finalize its recommendations (see attached) to the City Council. These recommendations, with a few minor modifications, generally refined the concepts earlier described in this report. The committee reached consensus to unanimously support the recommendations without expanding interior inspection routines beyond those which would focus on repeat codes offenders. This is significant in that Councilman Reimal, who has consistently advocated routine interior inspections for all rental units, has conceded that while the recommendations fall short of his initial personal zeal for a more stringent blanket inspection routine, he now believes that the program recommendations developed by the joint committee provide a fairly balanced approach to ensuring better enforcement of property codes compliance.

Committee recommendations are scheduled to be introduced to the City Council for an initial work session on November 8^th. The first of at least two hearings at which public testimony will be taken is scheduled for November 15^th. HAA members interested in testifying should plan accordingly.

The entire process, as we currently understand it, will carry through the month of December with first and second readings of specific related ordinances to be adopted by the City Council. It is the intent of the city staff that new regulations will take effect as early as possible in January, 2000.

We have been notified that the Community Development Committee of the Overland Park City Council will hold further discussion on pending rental unit regulation at its meeting on October 6^th. Larry Winn, Chase Simmons, and Sam Alpert are scheduled to meet on October 1^st to discuss these proceedings.